First sentence:
"He shifted nervously in the front passenger seat of the four-wheel-drive as it approached the southern exit of the city."
Description:
In the 1980s, a young archivist, Abdel Kader Haidara, journeyed across the Sahara Desert and along the Niver River, tracking down tens of thousands of ancient Islamic and secular manuscripts that were crumbling in the trunks of pastoralists and farmers. His goal: to preserve this crucial part of the world's patrimony. But then Al Qaeda showed up at the door.
The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu tells the remarkable true tale of how mild-mannered Haidara became one of the world's most prolific smugglers, organizing a heroic heist to sneak all 350,000 manuscripts to the safety of southern Mali. 'At once a history, caper and thriller' (The Economist), it is the extraordinary story of a man who, through extreme circumstances, discovered his higher calling--and a reminder that ordinary citizens often do the most to protect the beauty of their culture from the threats of the modern world." -- from the back cover
My thoughts:
I liked this book about a courageous archivist and his colleagues and how they saved literary treasures that otherwise would have been destroyed. I work in the library and archives world, but I am nowhere near as brave as Haidara. I recommend this book to anyone who's curious about both the history of Western Africa and its current fate.
Date read: 2022?
Genre: Nonfiction
Rating: 3*/5 = good
ISBN-10: 1476777411
ISBN-13: 9781476777412
Publisher: Simon & Shuster
Year: 2016
# of pages: 278
Binding: Trade Paperback
LibraryThing page
