Wednesday, May 13, 2009

An odd read

Among my Christmas gift books was House of Rain: Tracking a Vanished Civilization Across the American Southwest by Craig Childs. The civilization, as you might guess, is the Anasazi. Having visited Mesa Verde some years back, I wanted to learn more about what may have happened to them. So far, I am learning a fair bit about it, but I am learning lots more about Craig Childs. The key word in the title is TRACKING. Some writers barely make an impact in the story they tell. Not our Craig. For every page about the Anasazi, there are five about Craig looking for them or exploring. He spends a lot of time alone out in the desert Southwest and he is given to odd behavior like hopping into a flash flood and riding it and hiking through neighborhoods hiding from dogs. This doesn't make it bad, but you should be aware.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sounds like John Man's book about Genghis Khan. Just about the time you started to enjoy the book, he'd hit you with about 10 pages describing the facial features of some Mongolian goatherd who showed him his rock collection.

Sven

Tripp said...

I skipped ahead a bit and it looks like it going to end in the Sierra Madre, which I suspect will be cool. It doesn't kill the book, but it makes for a peculiar read at times.