Apples are from Kazakhstan: the Land that Disappeared

APPLES ARE FROM KAZAKHSTAN: THE LAND THAT DISAPPEARED; Christopher Robbins; New York: Atlas & Company, 2008; 296pp. Nonfiction

Easily the best book I have read this year, and among my top 5 favorite travel narratives of all time, Christopher Robbins history/travelogue/character study of Kazakhstan and her people is rich and fascinating reading and reveals with painful clarity the specious slander of the Borat movie. Robbins' interest in Kazakhstan began with a chance meeting with a man from Arkansas
on his way to Kazakhstan to marry a widow he met on the Internet. As they parted company the Arkansan said "apples are from Kazakhstan," and intrigued by the notion (which turned out to be true), Robbins followed up. The result is a fascinating narrative of the human result of Soviet repression on the people of the steppes, of the extraordinary beauty of a land largely invisible to the West, and of the character of a people who have brought their land back to life. Stories of open air atomic testing and the destruction of the Aral Sea alternate with hair-raising trips in -30 degree weather in a Soviet-era Lada with nearly treadless tires. Robbins had unparalleled access to Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev, a man of extraordinary vision and capacity who has brought Kazakhstan into the twenty-first century as one of the few successful former Soviet republics. Splendid.

LW