I just started reading Kabul in Winter by Ann Jones and, though I love literature about Afghanistan, I find myself constantly putting the book down in disgust. Despite claiming that the book is a journalistic account of life in the city after the fall of the Taliban, the writing is so absurdly biased that I can't take the author seriously. Take, for example, the following quote:
"Everyone knows that Bush the Lesser doesn't read history or much of anything else and thus may remain too this day the only person in the world who doesn't know that what followed the British invasion of Afghanistan in 1838-39 was the greatest military defeat in all of British history."
Ouch. But also lame. I might have strongly disagreed with his foreign policy, but I don't doubt that the man read stuff. In fact, I have it on good authority from one of his advisors that he liked to read EVERYTHING. The rest of the book follows a similar tone. The author disparages everyone working in Afghanistan from aid workers to local goverment officials and doesn't make any good arguments to support her distaste.
For a truly good account of life in Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban, read Asne Seierstad's The Bookseller of Kabul.
"Everyone knows that Bush the Lesser doesn't read history or much of anything else and thus may remain too this day the only person in the world who doesn't know that what followed the British invasion of Afghanistan in 1838-39 was the greatest military defeat in all of British history."
Ouch. But also lame. I might have strongly disagreed with his foreign policy, but I don't doubt that the man read stuff. In fact, I have it on good authority from one of his advisors that he liked to read EVERYTHING. The rest of the book follows a similar tone. The author disparages everyone working in Afghanistan from aid workers to local goverment officials and doesn't make any good arguments to support her distaste.
For a truly good account of life in Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban, read Asne Seierstad's The Bookseller of Kabul.
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