Elinor Burkett

Throughout the book I was reminded me of The Simpsons character, Reverend Lovejoy’s wife. Every time there was a controversy, she lamented “What about the children?!”

Elinor bravely challenges the sacredness of having children. Businesses and the government are catering to the child-bearing adults – namely the middle class and above adults – at the expense of the childfree and the low income families.

Like abortion, this is a subject that everyone has an already set opinion. However, show more it’s A LOT easier to make a speech about how wonderful children are than someone trying to explain to a single aunt about why you don’t have a child. It’s politically correct to want kids. I applaud Elinor for braving these waters; I’m sure she has lost a lot of friends. show less

Burkett's chronicle of her Fulbright year teaching journalism in Kyrgyzstan, with regional peregrinations, rebuts easy criticisms of the United States' behavior in the region. I appreciated this perspective, while at times finding Burkett a little jingoistic. Most tellingly, I am hard-pressed to remember any positive appraisal from her of this region's politics, governance, or infrastructure. Therefore, read with some skepticism; it is too easy an analysis for the U.S. to be basically show more helpful and put-upon and the former soviet to be inefficient and oppressive. show less

Elinor Burkett accepted a Fulbright scholarship to teach for a year in Central Asia post 9/11. This is an excellently written memoir of her travels and experiences throughout the region from Uzbekistan to Afghanistan to Iran and everywhere in between. She is adept at illiciting the locals opinions of politics, culture and the world, which often follows a rationale that is never even considered in the West. As someone suffering from wanderlust, I applaud the intrepid Ms. Burkett. She's much show more braver that I could ever be. show less

I have not enoyed reading History or nonfiction and was pleasantly surprised by this book. The author is a Pullitzer nominated journalist. The book is an easy read, covering the year she spent in Krygyzstan on a Fullbright exchange teaching Journalism, and her travels to other parts of Central Asia. She searches for the reasons for the purported hatred of Americans and reports on her time there and the people and culture she encounters. Her descriptions of her experiences drew me in and kept show more me very interested.
I enjoyed it; it has stimulated me to search out more on the history of the region, especially that of Afghanistan and the Taliban. show less