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The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan Paperback – March 6, 2012

by Kim Barker (Author)
4.1 4.1 out of 5 stars 966 ratings
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In this darkly comic and unsparing memoir that"tells us more about the Afghan debacle than any foreign policy briefing” (The Seattle Times),the famed investigative journalist uses her wry, incisive voice to expose the absurdities and tragedies of the “forgotten war,” finding humor and humanity amid the rubble and heartbreak.

When Kim Barker first arrived in Kabul as a journalist in 2002, she barely owned a passport, spoke only English and had little idea how to do the “Taliban Shuffle” between Afghanistan and Pakistan. No matter—her stories about Islamic militants and shaky reconstruction were soon overshadowed by the bigger news in Iraq. But as she delved deeper into Pakistan and Afghanistan, her love for the countries grew, along with her fear for their future stability. 

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  1. Print length
    320 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publication date
    March 6, 2012
  4. Dimensions
    5.19 x 0.73 x 8 inches
  5. ISBN-10
    9780307477385
  6. ISBN-13
    978-0307477385
  7. See all details
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Customer reviews

4.1 out of 5 stars
966 global ratings

Customers say

Customers find the book very readable, interesting, and captivating. They say it provides good insight into the chaos of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Readers also describe the book as witty and self-aware. Opinions differ on the pacing, with some finding it clear and quick, while others say it's difficult to follow the descriptions of the history of conflicts in the region.

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ReadabilityInsightHumorPacing
62 customers mention "Readability"62 positive0 negative

Customers find the book very worthwhile, interesting, and captivating. They say it's nuanced, insightful, entertaining, and spellbinding.

"...with the right amount of humor and reporting to make it a very worthwhile read for anyone who wants tu gain some insight to what it is like to live..." Read more

"...Plus it's funnier. On the other hand this book is so much more interesting and three dimensional than the movie, which in reality takes only about..." Read more

"...-absorption, however, "The Taliban Shuffle" is actually a pretty good read...." Read more

"...correspondent to someone with a deep love for Afghanistan makes for compelling reading." Read more

40 customers mention "Insight"40 positive0 negative

Customers find the book provides good insight into the chaos of Afghanistan and Pakistan. They say the author is perceptive about her subjects, including familiar names we see in the news. Readers also mention the book is entertaining as well as informative. They appreciate the personal and philosophical views.

"...But it is also honest and insightful, and an important voice against the apathy and dumbing down of US foreign journalism...." Read more

"...mastered the art of composing prose that is simultaneously compact, informative, and easy to read and understand, and although "The Taliban..." Read more

"...of the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan but also offers the human side of journalism and a personal consideration of what she is living...." Read more

"Very informative book about Afghanistan. Explains the complexity of the war in Afghanistan." Read more

26 customers mention "Humor"26 positive0 negative

Customers find the book witty, well-written, and full of emotion. They say it has the right amount of humor and reporting to make it worthwhile. Readers also mention the balance between serious, funny, and sad stuff is good.

"...Overall, I found the book very well-written with the right amount of humor and reporting to make it a very worthwhile read for anyone who wants tu..." Read more

"...Plus it's funnier...." Read more

"I loved the weird balance between, serious, funny and sad stuff...." Read more

"...She’s blunt, she’s funny and it feels like a report of things a journalist should write in order to make sure the world doesn’t ignore what’s..." Read more

35 customers mention "Pacing"23 positive12 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the pacing of the book. Some mention it's very readable, clear, and easy to understand. Others say it's difficult to follow in its descriptions of the history of conflicts in the region and gets a bit mired down in details.

"...Overall, I found the book very well-written with the right amount of humor and reporting to make it a very worthwhile read for anyone who wants tu..." Read more

"...prose that is simultaneously compact, informative, and easy to read and understand, and although "The Taliban Shuffle" is unequivocally a..." Read more

"...The lack of discussion on these issues aside, what is most frustrating is how she nonchalantly mentions how Afghanis are treated basically like..." Read more

"...in Barker's story as she is somewhat quirky, confident, and somewhat self-deprecating...." Read more

Top reviews from the United States

Jeff
5.0 out of 5 stars Insightful, witty, accurate
Reviewed in the United States on March 24, 2011
Verified Purchase
Kim Barker's portrait of life in Afghanistan and Pakistan during the mid 2000s is spot on accurate. I know because I spent those years in Kabul and Islamabad. Kim's book goes a long way in capturing the essence of those areas and the culture as lived by the westerners most of whom went over with the best of intentions but eventually came to realize that the only thing crazier than those places was our belief that we could change them into fully functioning western democracies.

Kim's honest portrayal of her road from naiveté to country "addiction" strikes home since I went thru much the same experience. She also gives good read about the mind of many of the ex-pats who went their to escape from something in their lie be it boredom, heartbreak or some other demon.

Her ability to be self deprecating without being maudlin was remarkable. She described her foibles without blaming others or playing the victim, a rare trait in these days of Oprah and Dr. Phil.

Overall, I found the book very well-written with the right amount of humor and reporting to make it a very worthwhile read for anyone who wants tu gain some insight to what it is like to live in some very strange places.
3 people found this helpful
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Doug Bowker
4.0 out of 5 stars Both More and Less than You Might Expect
Reviewed in the United States on June 11, 2016
Verified Purchase
3.5 STARS if that were possible.

Many, like me, probably will pick this book up after watching the movie Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot with Tina Fey. From that perspective I was both disappointed AND rewarded. If you've read other non-fiction accounts in the many political and military hotspots around the world, then you will most likely enjoy what is recounted here. If on the other hand 99% of what you read is fiction and you generally like to keep it light, I doubt this book will be your thing. I fall firmly into the former category and love books by journalists who are willing to go right to the edge in order to make sure the world doesn't ignore what's important. I believe Kim Barker did her best to be one of these journalists, but sadly wasn't taken as seriously (because of being a woman) both on the ground and back home where journalism of this kind was drying up.

COMPARISONS: The movie is much more linear and the scripting/story arc greatly tightened up. Plus it's funnier. On the other hand this book is so much more interesting and three dimensional than the movie, which in reality takes only about 1/3 of the book as it's source material. It also puts much more emphasis on the romantic and sexual relationships of the author, which in the book hardly happen at all. The movie almost makes these as primary plot movers, and it's obvious that they were all little more than tangential to Ms. Barker in her real life.

Towards the end of the book she basically admits that writing the book was as much a form of PTSD self-therapy as anything else. That doesn't invalidate the writing at all, but it does point out that it's not the sort of book that has a "story" or over-arching theme to follow. It's just like a lot of life and meaning isn't always easy to wring out of it. In that light, the book is definitely uneven at times, and rambles all around. But it is also honest and insightful, and an important voice against the apathy and dumbing down of US foreign journalism. It's partly an indictment against the lazy and often deadly approach the US takes to its foreign policy, though this judgment is not partisan, nor does it let the countries in question off the hook. It's because she ends up loving Afghanistan that she becomes so disillusioned by it's leaders and competing factions.
64 people found this helpful
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Rose Richards
3.0 out of 5 stars Worth reading, if you don't mind putting up with the author's first-world problems
Reviewed in the United States on March 19, 2016
Verified Purchase
From 2003 to 2009, Kim Barker was a foreign correspondent for the Chicago Tribune, eventually specializing in South Asia. When she first set foot in the region, she was almost the classically clueless foreigner, eager and confident but knowing little to nothing of the languages, religious customs, and subtle nuances of culture among the people she would meet there. Over the course of the next six years, she would come to feel strangely at home - and more alive than ever before - in a land scarred by centuries of conflict. She would learn "how to find money in a war zone, how to flatter a warlord, how to cover a suicide bombing, . . . how to do the Taliban shuffle between conflict zones." She would find herself embroiled in a mutually beneficial but bizarrely intense friendship with the Attorney General of Afghanistan, and pursued romantically by former (and future) Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. She would also discover the lively, if frequently debauched, subculture of Westerners in the Muslim world.

In "The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan," Barker recounts her experiences with honesty and humor. Barker isn't quite so funny a writer - nor so interesting a person - as she believes herself to be, and even as she mastered the tricks of the foreign correspondent's trade, I never got the sense that she actually understood the culture of the people she was living among, or even seriously tried to. Not even the most sympathetically portrayed Afghans and Pakistanis ever come across as more than comedic caricatures. Part of this is simply Barker's style - her boyfriends, fellow journalists, and other Westerners also come across as caricatures rather than complex characters - but it often felt vaguely condescending to me, as if she were laughing to herself not just at the quirks and foibles of individuals but at how exotically backwards she found the entire culture. She also whines quite a bit about her unstable relationships and how much she loves her job (yes, she actually whines about how excitingly addictive it is to work as a journalist in a war zone). If you can overlook Kim Barker's self-absorption, however, "The Taliban Shuffle" is actually a pretty good read. Barker excels at blending comic absurdity with genuine tension in a way that keeps the pages turning - and if sometimes she comes across as a little too flippant, it actually makes it all the more poignant when she lets the humorous tone drop altogether to discuss something serious. As a journalist, she's mastered the art of composing prose that is simultaneously compact, informative, and easy to read and understand, and although "The Taliban Shuffle" is unequivocally a memoir of her experiences rather than a history of the region, she takes enough care to set her adventures in the proper historical context that even readers who pick up this book knowing relatively little about the modern situation in Afghanistan and/or Pakistan will come away with a basic understanding. If you'd like to understand the political and military tensions in an important corner of the world stage but don't enjoy slogging through dry history texts, "The Taliban Shuffle" is probably just what the doctor ordered.
4 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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K. Mikschl
5.0 out of 5 stars Hammer!
Reviewed in Germany on May 27, 2019
Verified Purchase
Sehr cooles Buch! Ich hab's gesuchtet.
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Gonzalo Martín
3.0 out of 5 stars An interesting and funny chronicle of a female American press correspondent in the Afghan War
Reviewed in Spain on January 24, 2017
Verified Purchase
If you are looking to resemble the experience of the Sally Field's movie, forget it. It is not because adapting a book to a movie usually turns out in a different thing, it is because this book is focused on the Afghan an Pakistani current events and not that much in the personal affaires of the author, which is the movie's actual plot. Anyway, it is a funny and interesting chronicle of a foreign correspondent (a female in hard muslim countries) in the complicated atmosphere of the Afghan war and the role of the Pakistani government.
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PIERRE BERUBE
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in Canada on April 18, 2016
Verified Purchase
Excellent! Witty as well as informative.
P. B.
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Stefano
4.0 out of 5 stars Ottimo
Reviewed in Italy on June 30, 2014
Verified Purchase
Bel libro per gli am
anti del genere, storia amara dei nostri tempi. Magari sul finale si è perso un po.
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Wade K
5.0 out of 5 stars Barker is very readable, amusing and self effacing
Reviewed in Australia on June 16, 2016
Verified Purchase
A very humorous and enlightening book. Having worked in the media, worked in the Middle East, and worked with Journalists this really made me chuckle. But anyone at all will find this an interesting read as it's a good "peek behind the curtain" on both the media and the way things run in India, Pakistan & Afghanistan.

A very enjoyable writing style makes this a pleasure to pick up, especially as despite being a news writer, Barker is very amusing and self effacing.
Highly recommend!
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