Three Cups of Deceit
by Jon Krakauer
Byliner Originals (e-book)
Jon Krakauer was once a fan of Greg Mortenson, the American humanitarian whose charity, Central Asia Institute (CAI), has been behind the establishment of 170 schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan educating children, including girls. Not anymore. By 2004, he writes in Three Cups of Deceit, he 'had begun to suspect that Mortenson was improperly using CAI funds'. Having donated more than US$75,000 to the charity, Krakauer started interviewing people connected to the CAI, including its chief financial officer and a board member, Gordon Wiltsie, who resigned because Mortenson, he claimed, 'regards CAI as his personal ATM'. The scandal, aired on 60 Minutes, has been turned into an e-book. Krakauer, best known for Into Thin Air, has expended much energy in finding people with different versions of Mortenson's stories about finding the Pakistani village of Korphe in which he built his first school, being kidnapped by the Taliban, and more. The research is commendable but, in the end, this is a book with a limited audience.
Extras: none