From the Bookshelf of Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge…
Find A Copy At
Group Discussions About This Book
No group discussions for this book yet.
What Members Thought
The title alone would suggest some pulpy fiction reminiscent of King Solomon's Mines. However, Joshua Hammer's book is a meticulously researched history of Timbuktu. He expertly describes the history of the area and brings the reader up to date about recent ISIS threats.
The librarian Haidara inherited his father's manuscript collection with a mission: to recover and restore the lost heritage of Timbuktu. With the history of Muslim extremism it proves difficult to convince people to give it towar ...more
The librarian Haidara inherited his father's manuscript collection with a mission: to recover and restore the lost heritage of Timbuktu. With the history of Muslim extremism it proves difficult to convince people to give it towar ...more
Like others have said, this book is less about the librarians - specifically Abdel Kader Haidara - and more about Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. Which is not really what I wanted to read about, but I did actually learn some things, and had the background to be able to appreciate a work on this topic that I went into not knowing I was going to end up reading about it. Still, I would've liked a much different ratio of librarians to Al Qaeda, like 80%-20% or 70%-30%, at least, instead of the oppo
...more
Apr 08, 2016
CrystalIsReading on Storygraph
marked it as to-read
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
around-the-world-challenge
Feb 05, 2017
Agatha Donkar Lund
marked it as to-read
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
chpl-has-it
