Books we've enjoyed reading

The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency - Alexander McCall Smith
This is the first of a lovely series of books about the Miss Marple of Botswana. Very enjoyable, feel good and giving you a hint of African life and philosophies. We've read the first three books of the series and liked them all.

Shantaram - Gregory David Roberts
Impossible to put down! Compelling story about an Australian who escaped prison and ends up in India. Living with the people in India and learning several languages. Living and fighting alongside the Mujaheddin in Afghanistan.

Shackelton's Forgotten Men - Lennard Bickel
The amazing story of the group of explorers responsible for laying down the supply depots for Ernest Shackleton's 1915 attempt to cross Antarctica. Very topical, too.

America - Jon Stewart
Not just funny, sarcastic and scathing, but also educational and entertaining account of American history. We enjoyed the audio version on our drive upto Alaska.

Cryptonomicon - Neal Stephenson
A high-tech (focusing on cryptography) thriller set in WWII and the present. Well-written, funny and engaging.

Up Country by Nelson DeMille
A political thriller set in Vietnam. We enjoyed reading a novel in which the action takes place in many of the locations we visited in 2003. Also interesting to read about these locations from the perspective of a Vietnam vet - not something we got much of while we were in the country.

Five Quarters of the Orange - Joanne Harris
A dark story by the author of Chocolat about a family in France during the German occupation in WWII with the author's trademark inclusion of food and recipes interwoven into the story.

Fateful Harvest by Duff Wilson
The incredible true story of the discovery in a small Washington town that commercial fertilizer companies were (and still are) recycling and re-selling toxic industrial wastes (cadmium, lead , arsenic etc.) as fertilizer.

Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
The cover says "prepared to be dazzled"...that's correct! Levitt is an economist who looks at everyday issues from a unique viewpoint. He explains, for example, how the Roe v. Wade (the legal right to an abortion) decision is the real cause of the decrease in crime in America and why some school teachers choose to cheat on state exams for their students.

Various books on running, including: The Lore of Running by Tim Noakes and Marathon: You Can Do It by Jeff Galloway
Michiel is determined to run the marathon in Antarctica this year so he's preparing himself physically and mentally.

As you can tell, we've had lots of time to read. The weather has been gray and rainy and we're hanging out in Hope doing some house- and dog-sitting, so we've worked our way through all the books we can get our hands on. We are, however, saving the other Antarctica-related books we've received as gifts (THANKS!) for the long flights down to the ice.