Djibouti A Spy Guide World Spy Guide Library

Posted In: Djibouti

Victor Ferraris says...

I've read three Le Carre novels previously and was suitably satisfied and impressed.This one, however, fizzles and disappoints.The primary problem is that the story unfolds in a painfully slow and tortuous fashion, and redundancies abound.



There are also a lot of Britishisms to cope with--although some are quite humorous. Add to that some gratuitous snipes and slander directed at the American intellegence community, against which Le Carre has demonstrated uncontrollable loathing in the past.But politics aside, this book is one you may want to avoid--unless you need some help falling asleep at night.

Posted on July 6, 2011

Ileen Contrino says...

I have read almost every thing JLC has written ,and this is by far the most disapointing.He spends forever plodding thru and getting a tennis game completed. You know whats going to happen,you dont know how the characters wind up in the end. all in all you would be better off watching paint dry.

Posted on July 6, 2011

Minh Stoakley says...

This is another excellent bird guide by the authors. On a recent trip to Ethiopia, I found this book to be an indispensable companion. The drawings are outstanding as is the text on each bird. The range maps and in particular the elevation guides were very helpful in this geographically variable country. The details of this guide are well covered in previous reviews and this book would be a welcome addition to the library of those who love to travel in Africa. I left this guide with our local semi-bird guide to encourage his growth in birding. He was both emotional and appreciative to receive this book. I bought a new one on my arrival home.

Ted Peterson

Lynnwood WA USA

Posted on July 7, 2011

Jeremy Cackett says...

This was very much like his Cold War books, slow to build, then you get hooked and you follow the characters wanting to know what happens to them.However you only find out about 2 and then the book just ends.Period.No open ending of what may have happened.If this book has a sequel it will be the first time for LeCarr

Posted on July 7, 2011

Ronald Freeby says...

One of LeCarre's best of the post-Smiley books.Virtually every page contains a sentence that just takes your breath away.The ability to tell a broad sweep story while nailing the tiny details with a perfect turn of phrase puts LeCarre above all other living writers except,perhaps, Graham Swift.

The story moves gently along, gathering force as it goes and as the very human characters are unveiled to us.

I can't recommend it more highly.

The 1 star reviews baffle me until I read them and find most are from those who think price should be determined by cost of production instead of market forces. An interesting perspective which I thought had fallen with the Berlin Wall, but these "reviewers" have never read the book as they admit.

I am old-fashioned enough to judge a book by its content, not its cover price. If you agree, you will find enormous value here.

Posted on July 8, 2011

Ronna Lenig says...

With Le Carr

Posted on July 8, 2011

Yen Hakel says...

John le Carr

Posted on July 10, 2011

Anika Mastrianni says...

I'm always surprised at how quickly people forget: one reviewer, disappointed by the ending of "Our Kind of Traitor." says Le Carre should come in out of the cold. Does that person not recall the tragic ending of that novel?



And so it goes through all these negative reviews: everyone forgetting that JLC is not here to tell us happy-ending thriller-diller stories. He's mirroring the world as he sees it and rarely has a writer done such a fine job of doing just that.



Think about it, folks: what was the last JLC novel that didn't end in tears? It's the nature of the game that it ends badly. It's a stupid game, for sure, and JLC does not hide his disdain.



So live with it or go back to the pulp thriller writers. JLC is an artist. And the great news is that, according to an interview I heard recently, he's giving up on the promotional cycle that have forced him into the one-book-per-year model of publishing. JLC is going rogue: he said that he still has a lot to write and he's going to get on with it. Fantastic: I hope we see two novels a year from this maestro.

Posted on July 11, 2011

Ernestina Linen says...

Basics:2009, softcover, 496pp, field/identification guide, 213 color plates of all 1,000+ species in the region; range maps



This is another top quality book produced by the authors for the eastern region of Africa.Upon opening this book, you'll recognize many of the plates from their earlier work, "Field Guide to the Birds of East Africa" (see #6 below).You'll also see many new plates along with modifications of prior ones.



The artistry is very good, easily making this book equal to or better than any other field guide on African birds.The 213 color plates illustrate all 1,000+ species found in the four "Horn" countries of Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Somalia (plus the island of Socotra, which belongs to Yemen).Nearly every bird is shown with multiple (2-5) drawings that display excellent detail.The Yellow Wagtail has 13 different illustrations that compare the wide variation of this species.The plates do a great job at showing variations between genders, ages, and subspecies.I especially appreciated the extra effort that went into separating out the many subspecies.Additional focus seems to have been given to in-flight poses for many of the non-passerines.



A brief paragraph is given for each bird across from its illustration.Although the amount of text may seem light, the information is very informative, to the point, and precise.About 80% of the information is on identification.A couple more lines are dedicated to habitat, distribution notes, and voice.You may want to take note of the font size, which is small and thin; consequently, you might want to have your reading glasses handy.



The range maps - one for each bird - shows the resident, breeding, and non-breeding ranges in three different colors.These maps reflect the bird's range within only the four countries and artificially stop at the political borders.The maps show very good detail; however, this is sometimes difficult to make out due to the shaded highland regions in the background and to the rather faint gray boundaries that separate the countries.Ranges of birds with a very restricted distribution (e.g., Sidamo Lark, Ash's Lark, Djibouti Francolin, Black-backed Cisticola) can be difficult to see with just a small dot representing the range.Inserting an arrow would have been helpful.Making a more prominent note of the 70+ endemics would also have been appreciated, versus simply burying the word "endemic" within the text.



In case you're wondering if you would need this book over the authors' prior book for East Africa, the answer is "Yes, if you are visiting any of these four countries."Twenty percent of the birds found in the Horn are not in the other book.Also, when there is overlap of the species between the two regions, the authors' have modified the plates to reflect the plumages of the local subspecies.



This is a superb guide that will be essential for birding in these countries.Being the only complete book for this region makes it even more indispensible.



1) Birds of Ethiopia and Eritrea by Atkins/Ash

2) Ethiopia's Endemic Birds by Urban

3) A Guide to Endemic Birds of Ethiopia and Eritrea by Pol

4) Ethiopia: In Search of Endemic Birds by Francis

5) Birds of Somalia by Ash

6) Field Guide to the Birds of East Africa by Stevenson

7) Birds of Africa South of the Sahara by Sinclair/Ryan

8) Birds of Kenya and Northern Tanzania by Zimmerman

9) A Checklist of the Birds of Ethiopia by Urban

(written by Soleglad at Avian Review or Avian Books, May 2009)

Posted on July 12, 2011

Jayna Arnst says...

John le Carre is one of those authors that everybody tells me I should read, and whom I really want to read. But his towering body of work is... a little intimidating.



So I decided to start with "Our Kind of Traitor," his latest thriller. And it's a solid place to start -- new characters that don't require previous books to understand, heart-pounding suspense, and a genteel British gloss. It's an intelligent and gripping story, but at times le Carre seems to just lose his enthusiasm..



Young Oxford don Perry and his lawyer girlfriend Gail are on vacation in Antigua when they encounter Dima, a Russian millionaire with a large, grim family, a hearty love of the English, and a lavish hand with money. It turns out that he's a professional money-launderer in trouble with a mobster called The Prince. He's willing to spill everything he knows, as long as he and his family are kept safe.



Enter Hector Meredith, an aging spy who runs his own little sub-agency, and who is Dima's best chance of not getting killed. But Perry and Gail "have wandered by sheer accident into a richly planted minefield," and under Hector's guidance they soon find themselves whisked on an international adventure...



"Our Kind of Traitor" is a brilliant novel that's been hobbled. The first few chapters are mostly told in flashback, which saps some of the tension from the story. And the last few chapters feel as if John le Carre got tired of the story he was telling, so he slapped together an ending and pasted it on the end.



So as you can guess, the best part is the middle. Le Carre's prose is smooth, genteel and distinctly British, but fractured with some gritty looks at the underbelly of civilization. The cynicism is heaped high everywhere, whether it's contemptuous looks at the British government, the corrupt banking world, or the bleak, cutthroat world of Russian mobsters.



And le Carre does a pretty good job with the characters, who all feel realistic, flawed and sympathetic. Perry and Gail are a pampered, slightly self-righteous British couple who end up waaaaayyyyy in over their heads. Hector is a tweedy, outspoken old spy, while Dima is a sort of Russian Tony Soprano, whose genial exterior hides his fear and rage.



"Our Kind of Traitor" is a smooth, rich thriller with its ankles shackled -- great writing, rich characters, but it suffers from a limp beginning and a slapdash ending.

Posted on July 15, 2011