This novel vividly narrates the tale of a young diplomat who embarks on a arduous trek across Afghanistan in 1946.

His mission is to locate an American woman from Pennsylvania who has eloped and married a local man, ultimately joining a caravan of nomads.

However, contrary to being a typical adventure story, it is more of a captivating travelogue that explores the diverse locations and cultures within the country.

And this is precisely its selling point. Written in 1963, it also serves as a profound reflection on the potential future of that nation and emphasizes how we are all more alike than we think.

Back then, they were advancing in a much more progressive way compared to their current situation.

Afghanistan has held a special allure for me ever since I took a Central Asian Studies course in college.

Michener was undoubtedly charmed by the nation and its people, and his afterword explaining why he chose to write this is truly fascinating, especially when viewed from the perspective of 50 years ago.

The story got off to a rather slow start. However, once Miller embarked on his search for Ellen, the pace really picked up significantly. At that point, I found myself eagerly anticipating what would happen next.

Throughout the narrative, I also learned a great deal about Afghanistan and its people during the 1940s. The descriptions and details provided offered a fascinating glimpse into that particular time and place.

One aspect that I would have really loved to see was whether Miller and Mira eventually got together. They seemed to be a good pair, with a certain chemistry and connection. It would have been interesting to follow their relationship further and see how it developed.

Overall, despite the slow beginning, the story managed to draw me in and keep me engaged until the end.

Sadly, this was just about the worst book by James Michener I have ever read.

Perhaps that was a bit harsh. Let me rephrase. This was just about my “least favorite” book by the renowned author.

Opinions, after all, can vary greatly, and the judgment of an author’s work is highly subjective.

If you decide to pick up this particular volume, I sincerely hope you’ll have a more enjoyable reading experience than I did.

Most of Michener’s greatest works center around a specific geography.

Books like “Texas”, “Poland”, “Alaska”, and “Caribbean” span thousands of years of a particular location, with a focus on fictional characters who inhabit that specific area.

As these novels unfold, we become engrossed in the complex and intertwined lives of the characters, which are always influenced by the unique characteristics of the region.

Michener has a remarkable ability to tell captivating stories while simultaneously educating the reader about the place he is highlighting.

With a title like “Caravans”, one might expect this book to be a bit different.

And indeed, it is different in that the story doesn’t span several millennia.

However, this book does focus on a particular geography, which ultimately turned out to be a major disappointment for me.

The setting is Afghanistan in 1946.

There is an actual plot, but Michener seems to devote far more time to describing the place than developing the plot.

To be brutally honest, Afghanistan simply isn’t a very appealing place to read about.

In fact, it comes across as depressing, unhygienic, and unattractive.

There was nothing about this location that held any charm for me.

Strangely, Michener states in the book’s postscript that he has some sort of strange affection for the country.

I guess if one shares that sentiment, they might actually find enjoyment in this book.

The plot involves a young American woman who, against her parents’ wishes, marries an Afghan native and relocates to the desolate region, only to seemingly disappear.

A young U.S. Embassy employee named Miller is then tasked with finding her.

During the search, we are so distracted by the detailed observations about the customs and indigenous people of the area that at times we almost forget there is a plot underway.

We read about a barbaric place where women are treated like animals, theft is commonplace, and public executions by stoning occur for acts of adultery.

Poverty is widespread, dysentery is rampant, and the stench of camel dung seems to linger throughout the pages.

This book left me with a strong desire to take a long, hot bath.

As the story progresses, I found the plot to be extremely weak.

Something about a young person “rebelling” against their comfortable Western upbringing by abandoning everything and living as a so-called “free spirit” in such a harsh and primitive place just didn’t seem believable to me.

Michener explored a similar topic in “The Drifters” about 1970 hippies, but at least that book took the reader to more culturally rich and civilized locations.

The story here, on the other hand, felt completely unbelievable.

There are also some rather odd diversions in the book.

For example, early on, we have an entire chapter dedicated to Miller and his colleagues writing and performing a play for each other at a U.S. Embassy Office.

I have no idea what such a strange episode is doing in a story like this.

My only guess is that Afghanistan is such a primitive place that there is simply nothing else to do for those from the U.S. who find themselves assigned there.

I just couldn’t understand it.

Perhaps this book was better received when it was first published in 1963 than it is today, but I was highly disappointed.

The only positive aspect of this experience is that, compared to Michener’s other works, this book is relatively short, at around 430 pages in paperback.

If I had been forced to read one of his typically massive tomes, which often exceed 1000 pages, I’m quite certain I would have given up.

This was not a pleasant way to spend my leisure time, and it has definitely made me less inclined to ever visit Afghanistan.

On a bleak wintry morning some years ago, I was unexpectedly summoned to the office of our naval attaché at the American embassy in Kabul. The cold air seemed to seep into my bones as I made my way there.

The embassy compound was a hive of activity, yet there was an underlying tension in the air.

Once inside the attaché's office, I was greeted with a serious expression. The task at hand was not going to be easy.

If one can block out the fact that the chase story is completely implausible, then there is some very interesting stuff to consider. The events that unfolded were not only interesting but also worrying and brutally real.

As I delved deeper into the situation, I realized the complexity and gravity of it all. It was a situation that would test my skills and resolve.

Despite the challenges, I was determined to do my best and see it through to the end. Little did I know what lay ahead in this thrilling and dangerous adventure.

Afghanistan is a country that has been through a great deal of turmoil and upheaval in recent years. The situation there is truly chaotic and seems almost crazy at times. The political instability, ongoing conflicts, and displacement of people have created a sense of uncertainty and fear among the population.

The Taliban's return to power has brought with it a new set of challenges and changes. The international community is closely watching the developments in Afghanistan, concerned about the future of the country and the rights and freedoms of its people. There are many questions that remain unanswered, such as how the Taliban will govern, what kind of relationship they will have with the rest of the world, and how they will address the pressing issues of poverty, education, and healthcare.

Despite the difficult circumstances, the people of Afghanistan continue to show remarkable resilience and strength. They are determined to rebuild their lives and their country, and are hopeful for a better future. It is our responsibility as the international community to support them in this endeavor and to work towards a peaceful and stable Afghanistan.

It's quite interesting. Throughout all my readings, I've never truly been a big fan of Michener.

Each time I pick up one of his works, I do find the history aspect enjoyable. However, there's just something about his writing style that fails to strike a chord with me.

That being said, "Caravans" takes you on a thrilling adventure into the heart of Afghanistan in 1946. A young American Jewish consulate worker is dispatched to locate a missing American woman who married an Afghan due to her disdain for her father's bourgeois American lifestyle.

As you travel through the country with the characters, you get a fascinating glimpse of Afghanistan's culture, history, economics, and society in the 1950s, before the more recent events that have transformed the nation.

On the positive side, Michener was remarkably prophetic in his analysis of the region, stating that either the Russians or the Americans would ultimately be drawn into this country (considering he penned this in 1963). There's also no question about his deep affection for both the people and the country during his time there in the 1950s, which shines through his writing.

If you have an interest in Afghan history, this book could be a great starting point, provided you can overlook the insipid male chauvinism and homo-eroticism that are scattered throughout. Nevertheless, it must be admitted that the book is somewhat dated.

In this a subtle bildungsroman, Michener's somewhat wide-eyed but quick-witted State Department official Mark Miller embarks on a journey through Afghanistan in search of a missing American woman, Ellen. She is not only lost physically but has also lost herself. Mark soon finds himself joining her in this mysterious land.

Mark traverses a country that defies easy definition. It is a land that has been more invaded, occupied, and changed hands than perhaps most anywhere else in the world. As he travels, he encounters a chaotic jumble of cultures, traditions, habits of action, modes of thinking, and political and historical realities. In the face of this, his initial frames of understanding prove inadequate. He dallies with the idea of living purely in the present, and in the end, of course, he undergoes a transformation.

Afghanistan, in many ways, remains more or less the same. It is a place that has endured countless upheavals and yet maintains a certain stubborn resilience. But for Mark, nothing remains the same. His experiences in this land force him to confront his own assumptions and beliefs, and in doing so, he emerges a changed man. Join Mark and experience the profound change that comes from encountering the immutable realities of Afghanistan.

Still timely after all these years.

Michener provides a vivid description of a land that is wild, harsh, and unforgiving.

The people who inhabit this land are shown to be resilient, able to withstand the challenges and difficulties that come their way.

What is truly remarkable is Michener's portrayal of the political future, which is amazingly close to what has actually occurred in the last 20 years.

His insights and observations offer a unique perspective on the events that have shaped our world.

It is a testament to his talent as a writer that his work remains relevant and thought-provoking even after all these years.

Reading Michener's description of this land and its people, one cannot help but be drawn into their story and gain a deeper understanding of the forces that have shaped their lives.

His work serves as a reminder of the importance of history and the lessons we can learn from it.

Overall, Michener's description is a powerful and engaging piece of writing that continues to captivate readers today.

Portions of this short novel are indeed very good, and it held great promise in its early pages.

Clearly, Michener was grappling with the weaknesses of his fiction writing. Since his debut work 16 years previously, it had remained static and almost unbearably amateurish. Michener must have been aware that his great (and formidable) strength lay in informational writing. His nonfiction work is uniformly excellent, even if the reader didn't always concur with his opinions on various matters.

_Hawaii_ was a triumph of fiction for him, but only due to his tremendous grasp of facts and his presentation of them, which helped to conceal his ongoing weaknesses as a novelist.

In this book, he was continuing to experiment with balancing information and fiction. However, the weaknesses of his fictional palette outweigh the information in this volume. His characters and their motivations increasingly detract from the much more interesting portrayal of Afghanistan as Michener had known it 17 years earlier (in 1946).

He uses the book, in part, to conduct an interesting dialectical analysis of the conflict between "civilization" (which, for Michener, always meant "modern" American mores and institutions as he was a Western liberal) and "primitive societies" (in this case, a scale that trends "downward" from the urban centers of Afghanistan, mainly Kabul, to the nomadic caravans that were able for a time to ignore national boundaries entirely and roam from Afghanistan into India and Russia).

The problem that confronts Michener's protagonist, a Republican officer in the American embassy in Kabul, is the puzzling disappearance of a young American woman who married an Afghan man. His search for Ellen Jaspars takes the Jewish officer Mark Miller from Kabul into a wandering tribal caravan and forces him into the company of a Nazi war criminal, Otto Stiglitz. This is the first derailment of Michener's plot, which I'm certain played well in the early 1960s: an interrogation of Nazi barbarism through the eyes of an American of Jewish heritage.

Unfortunately, Michener's inability to adequately plot and characterize this novel and its central figures compels him to resort to very clumsy stereotyping in the climax of the work, a move that renders his more nuanced thinking about "civilization"/"barbarism" relatively immaterial.

Somewhat more problematic for contemporary readers of this 59-year-old work are the sexist and white-supremacist implications of the central mysterious figure Ellen Jaspars. She is depicted as a siren whose allure for all men (because of her "Aryan" good looks, which Michener explicitly mentions to the reader) inevitably leads to their destruction due to her hypersexualized and independent will.

That Michener's Jewish protagonist should be hopelessly captivated by the blonde-haired and blue-eyed figure of racial supremacy is merely the most apparent of the disturbing implications lurking at the heart of Michener's book and his Western liberal ethos: the white race will always prevail over the barbarism and degeneracy of the "primitive" culture of the world, which must be endlessly romanticized because of their impending demise before the bulldozer of the American modernization of the world.

Thankfully, Michener's clumsy handling of the fictional portion of his book mars the philosophical thrust of the book as a whole. We can set aside this work without too much concern and direct our eyes and minds to Michener's later and (presumably) more mature works.

Afghanistan, before the Taliban, was a land filled with an interesting and diverse view. It was a place where different cultures and traditions intertwined, creating a unique tapestry of life. The people were warm and friendly, always ready to welcome strangers with open arms. The cities were bustling with activity, with markets filled with colorful goods and the sounds of vendors叫卖 their wares. There were beautiful mosques and historical monuments that stood as testaments to the rich history of the country. It was a place where art and music flourished, and where people could come together to celebrate life. The story of Afghanistan before the Taliban is a great one, filled with hope, love, and a sense of community. It is a story that should not be forgotten, and one that can serve as an inspiration for the future.

Published in 1963 and set in 1946 - 7 (before the Partition of India), this book serves as a reminder of what a great investigator and thoughtful writer Michener was.

However, the story itself is outmoded, and Michener doesn't demonstrate great insight into the psychology of his characters. One can't help but wonder if anyone in "exceptional" America read it. Consider when Charlie Wilson went to arm the Taliban against the Soviet-supported regime, or when soldiers were sent after 9/11 and remained there for a dozen years.

The author described Kabul as resembling Palestine in Jesus' day, with death by stoning, an eye for an eye and a life for a life. The fate of the country was to be determined when Afghanistan was left to itself, in the struggle between the many bearded men led by mullahs from the hills and the few young experts with degrees from Oxford, Sorbonne or MIT. The former made up 99 percent of the country.

"We are a brigand society and we murder our rulers," says one of the characters. There are striking descriptions of a violent and very different society that has likely not changed much. Except perhaps that the munitions have multiplied, the mullahs have been reinforced with money and ideology from an even more fundamentalist source, and the young experts are very likely all corrupted or disenchanted.

It is a quiet book and doesn't address the political issues directly. But, did anyone within the Beltway, ANYONE, read it?

Ten years ago, I was serving in Afghanistan as a foreign service officer. This historical fiction account, written in the 1950s, is about Michner's experience in the 1940s. In many aspects, Afghanistan has remained unchanged, especially in the southern provinces. It is a country still bound by tribal traditions and struggling with modernism in both infrastructure and culture. There is a significant background on the Russian influence at the start of the Cold War.

The story intricately weaves the journey of Miller, a foreign service officer, into the Afghan culture. He encounters numerous remarkable characters, both Afghan and Western. The great humanity展现 in these characters makes this book truly outstanding. It offers a vivid portrayal of the challenges and interactions that occur when different cultures collide.

As I read this account, it brought back memories of my own experiences in Afghanistan. The descriptions of the landscapes, the people, and the customs were so vivid that it felt as if I was reliving those moments. It made me realize how much Afghanistan has endured over the years and how resilient its people are.

This book is not just a fictional story; it is a window into a different time and place. It allows readers to gain a deeper understanding of the complex history and culture of Afghanistan. It is a must-read for anyone interested in history, international relations, or simply a good story.