Carol H. (Bookbakery) -
"Readers couldn't have a better companion for making their own armchair visit to this perennially fascinating part of the world" -- Chicago Tribune
In 1989, as a result of glasnost and under the auspices of the National Geographic Society, Geoffrey Moorhouse was invited to travel freely in the region then known as Soviet Central Asia. "ON THE OTHER SIDE" is his account of that fascinating trip. His route took him from Alma-Ata in Kazakhstan to Tashkent, Bukhara, and the storied city of Samarkand; from remote rural villages to ancient sites of legendary civilizations; from the ruins of Merv -- smashed to rubble by Genghiz Khan in 1221 -- to a collective farm that once was Stalin's concentration camp for the wives of political prisoners. Writing with the same keen eye for detail, compelling narrative voice, and wonderful grasp of history that have distinguished all of his books, Geoffrey Moorhouse captures the paradoxes, conflicts, and vitality of this giant agglomeration of mismatched republics at a key moment in their richly tumultuous hisotry.
A Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and the Royal Society of Literature, Geoffrey Moorehouse is the author of 14 books, among them the classic Calcutta and the Thomas Cook Award-winner "To the Frontier."
In 1989, as a result of glasnost and under the auspices of the National Geographic Society, Geoffrey Moorhouse was invited to travel freely in the region then known as Soviet Central Asia. "ON THE OTHER SIDE" is his account of that fascinating trip. His route took him from Alma-Ata in Kazakhstan to Tashkent, Bukhara, and the storied city of Samarkand; from remote rural villages to ancient sites of legendary civilizations; from the ruins of Merv -- smashed to rubble by Genghiz Khan in 1221 -- to a collective farm that once was Stalin's concentration camp for the wives of political prisoners. Writing with the same keen eye for detail, compelling narrative voice, and wonderful grasp of history that have distinguished all of his books, Geoffrey Moorhouse captures the paradoxes, conflicts, and vitality of this giant agglomeration of mismatched republics at a key moment in their richly tumultuous hisotry.
A Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and the Royal Society of Literature, Geoffrey Moorehouse is the author of 14 books, among them the classic Calcutta and the Thomas Cook Award-winner "To the Frontier."
