Three Cups of Tea: The Young Reader's Edition

by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin. Adapted by Sarah Thomson. Foreword by Jane Goodall. Includes interview with Amira Mortenson

Three Cups of Tea: Young Reader's Edition was our selection for our Parent-Child Book Club. The man who this book is about, Greg Mortenson, won the Sitara-e-Pakistan award from Pakistan and was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. Three Cups of Tea has won several awards. You can visit his websites: Three Cups of Tea, The Central Asia Institute, and Pennies for Peace.

Three Cups of Tea is about Greg Mortenson's mission to build schools and give education to poor children, especially girls, in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Greg was climbing K2 to put his sister's amber necklace at the top of the mountain. Christa, his sister, had died of seizure on her twenty-third birthday in 1992. In attempt to climb the mountain, he got lost and drifted into a small village, Korphe. He met the people of Korphe and he promised to build a school. Fortunately, a mountain climber and scientist, Jean Hoerni, gave him a check for twelve thousand dollars, enough to build his school. When he went to Korphe again, he had to first build a bridge, but luckily, on December 10th 1996, the Korphe School was finished. After that, he kept on building more schools. Now, Greg Mortenson is the director of the Central Asia Institute and is still building more schools.

This book was a fantastic read and I am sure that everyone will enjoy this book- adults or kids. But, I felt that at the start, the speed of events went very slowly, as it was written with phrases that explained very little action that happened. About halfway through the book, the speed changed. Another point is that most of the characters introduced into the book were very hard to keep up with. Some of them were mentioned at the start and then not mentioned until the very end. However, Greg Mortenson is a fabulous character and I know that everyone will enjoy reading about his adventure.

Reviewed by Kate