#1: Three Cups of Tea, Mortenson and Relin

On the bright side, I'm pleased to announce - after 2009's dismal list - that I've already finished a book this year! (Yes, I realize this is nothing much to brag about, but I'm just coming off the heels of blogging about my failures.) But, on the shadier side of the street, I'm sad to say that I didn't love Three Cups of Tea. I liked the idea of it but I just didn't think the book lived up to its promise or intentions - much like the similarly themed A Mighty Heart.

For those who have escaped its all-encompassing hold on the bestseller list (I had to go to a second bookstore to buy it before Christmas; the first was totally sold out), Three Cups of Tea is the story of mountaineer Greg Mortenson. After a failed effort to climb K2, he stumbles off the mountain, loses his way, and ends up in a random Pakistani village called Korphe. The people there take him in and get him back on his feet and Mortenson decides he wants to do something for them, to repay their kindness. So he builds them a bridge and a school and the effort sets him on a new life path, building schools for other impoverished villages throughout the country.

I think the book could have ended there and it would have been wonderful...it's really interesting how Mortenson navigated his personal demons, virtual bankruptcy, and Pakistan's unique ins-and-outs to successfully build a bunch of schools and make a difference. But Three Cups of Tea just sort of went on and on. After the first couple of schools, it was the same story over and over again, but without the drama, since he'd pretty much already conquered it.

But more than anything, by the end of the book, I felt like I was reading a public-relations manifesto...and I started to distrust it. The format of the book is incredibly strange - is it an autobiography? a biography? a really long magazine profile? On the surface, Three Cups of Tea is presented as an autobiography, written by Mortenson with help from journalist David Oliver Relin. But it's not, not really, because it's not written in the first person, with Mortenson's voice -- rather, it's written like a magazine article, in third person with scene-setting and interviews and quotes. Which is an interesting way to go, and I quite liked the format, until I started to realize that Three Cups of Tea lacks one basic tenet of journalism: objectivity.

Mortenson is presented almost as a god -- and granted, he seems like a genuinely good person -- but in the last 100 pages or so, Relin starts using these ridiculously fawning quotes, which struck me as overkill. Mortenson's actions stand for themselves, and it seemed a little over-the-top to have people like Mary Bono and Parade's editor-in-chief falling all over themselves to call him a "real American hero." Added to that, I think the book glossed over the difficult parts - at one point, some of the board members leave Mortenson's Central Asia Institute because they don't agree with his management style, and the whole thing only gets two paragraphs. I felt like everyone was afraid to let Mortenson be real on the page. Which just seems weird -- can't he still be a good person and still have some flaws?

Anyway...I'm onto book #2 now, The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver. So far, so good...