Reading

I've hardly made a dent in my reading list. In the last big bad wolf sale I must have bought over 30 books, and so far have read only about 5 or 6, mainly the ones by Nora Roberts and Julia Quinn because they're the easy to read ones. I still have a lot to go through.- travel books, a biography of Dr Mahathir, a book by Tahir Shah entitled In Search of King Solomon's MInes and another travel book entitled Two Caravans.

I've just finished Anderson Cooper's book -News from the Edge, which reads a lot like his programme 60 minutes. I remember at one time, as a teenager I very much wanted to be a journalist and this book is actually his experiences in all the various hot spots of the world - from Darfur in Sudan to Bosnia and Iraq, even Afghanistan. Written in an exciting journalistic style, Cooper recounts his experiences in these dangerous places, some of which were very very dangerous and he was even taken captive at one time in Africa. Interspersed with these are his memories of his childhood, his feelings when his father died suddenly leaving him and his brother confused for a long time. He also recounted the time when his brother killed himself and how it affected him. For along time he used to wonder why his brother did it and  for a while felt that it was his fault that he did not see it coming. Generally an interesting recount of a journalist's experiences during war time all over the world, an indepth look at Anderson Cooper's life. But reading them  I find that it is a typical American view of the state of war, however objective he tries to be. Many of the places he described were Muslim countries - Afghanistan, Bosnia, Iraq, Palestine, Jordan , Sudan as well as Somalia. They are war torn countries mainly because of poverty, corruption and the fight for power. But they were also sometimes caused by interference by whatever American government then in power which Cooper does not even mention in the book.

In the big bad wolf sale I also found a book by one of my favourite authors - James Herriot - who wrote "All creatures big and small". This one is "Vet in harness" and like the other books written by him hugely entertaining and really funny. Imagine my delight when I also managed to get a whole set of Madeline L' Engle's books- A Wrinkle in Time,A Wind in the Door,A Swiftly Tilting Planet, An Acceptable Time and the last one - Many Waters. These books for children are real gems and she won the Newbery Medal for Children's Literature.I had already read most of them of course - borrowed from my daughter Shasha. These books tell about three children who were growing up in 60s America but they are as different from other children's books as chalk from cheese. They flip from the world of reality to unreality and entwines fantasy and science fiction. Even as an adult when I read the first book so many years ago I was immediately gripped into the children's world of suspense and excitement. Now I have my own set and can read them again and again as I always love to do with my favourite books.