Kim Barker is not your typical foreign correspondent. Raised in Montana, at thirty she had barely been overseas, spoke only English, and knew little about Islam and even less about Osama Bin Laden. But none of that would stop her from heading to Afghanistan and Pakistan to cover the fallout from 9/11.

When she arrives, Kim makes all sorts of mistakes - from eating toxic sushi, to forgetting her money on her first trip to Kabul - but soon she grows into a wisecracking, seasoned reporter, with grave concerns about the ability of US might to win hearts and minds in the region.

As she moves between conflict zones, Kim offers a close-up account of the war, and of the people at its heart, finding humour and humanity amid the rubble and the heartbreak.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot captures the absurdity and tragedy of our modern wars, and gives us an unlikely but unforgettable heroine for our times.

About the Author
Kim Barker grew up in Montana, Wyoming, and Oregon, and graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in journalism. She worked at The Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Washington, for four years, and The Seattle Times for two years, winning awards for her investigative reporting. In 2001, at age 30, she joined the Chicago Tribune, and began making reporting trips to Afghanistan and Pakistan the next year. Barker was the Tribune's South Asia bureau chief from 2004 to 2009. She was then awarded the Council on Foreign Relations' Edward R. Murrow press fellowship to study Afghanistan and Pakistan. She now lives in New York City, where she works as a reporter at ProPublica.

Reviews

'Remarkable ... Kim Barker is a sort of Tina Fey character, who unexpectedly finds herself addicted to the adrenaline rush of war ... [She has] discovered a voice ... that enables her to capture both the serious and the seriously absurd conditions in Af-Pak, and the surreal deal of being a female reporter there ... [Barker] has written an account of her experiences covering Afghanistan and Pakistan that manages to be hilarious and harrowing, witty and illuminating, all at the same time.'

-- Michiko Kakutani * The New York Times *

'Multilayered and darkly comic.'

* Sunday Times *

'Part war memoir, part tale of self-discovery that, thanks to Barker's biting honesty and wry wit [it] manages to be both hilarious and heartbreaking.'

-- Heidi Stevens * Chicago Tribune *

'Kim Barker gives a true and amusing picture of hellholes and the reporters on assignment in them. But she breaks the journo code of silence and reveals a trade secret of the hacks who cover hellholes: The hell of the holes is that they're kind of fun.'

-- P. J. O'Rourke

'Laugh-out-loud funny, it is the true story of what it is like to be a female journalist in one of the world's most exotic war zones, while telling the reader much about what is really going on today in Afghanistan and Pakistan.'

-- Peter Bergen

'Whiskey Tango Foxtrot isn't like any other book out there about Afghanistan and Pakistan. It's witty, brilliant, and impossible to put down.'

-- Rajiv Chandrasekaran, author of Imperial Life in the Emerald City

'Yes, there are bombs. And there is carnage. And all sorts of mayhem. But mostly there are people, human beings even, with appetites - for life, for adventure, for riches, for love. Ms. Barker offers this world - the human world caught in the crosshairs of history - with a vitality rarely seen in accounts of the war. A compelling read that offers readers a glimpse of the goings-on behind the byline.'

-- J. Maarten Troost, author of The Sex Lives of Cannibals

'Politically astute and clearly influenced by Hunter S. Thompson, Barker provides sharp commentary on the impotence of American foreign policy in South Asia after the victory against the Taliban ... Fierce, funny, and unflinchingly honest.'

* Kirkus Reviews *

'At once funny and harrowing, insightful and appalling ... Whiskey Tango Foxtrot will pull you in so deep that you'll smell the poppies and quake from the bombs.'

* The Minneapolis Star Tribune *

'What you'd hear if the reporter never turned off the voice recorder between interviews - brilliant firsthand outtakes that wind up telling us more about the Afghan debacle than any foreign policy briefing.'

* The Seattle Times *

'If you're looking for a window on the challenges facing Afghanistan and Pakistan today - from a resurgent Taliban to American incompetence to Afghan and Pakistani corruption and nepotism - Barker provides a sterling vantage point.'

* San Francisco Chronicle *

'Candid and darkly comic ... With self-deprecation and a keen eye for the absurd, Barker describes her evolution from a green, fill-in correspondent to an adrenaline junkie.'

* Publisher's Weekly *

'[An] immensely entertaining memoir.'

* The Boston Globe *

'Reveals many enduring truths ... Novel both for its humour and for its perspective ... it rises (or sinks) to levels of seriousness that will be remembered long after the po-faced analysis of other writers has been forgotten.'

* The National *

'Brilliant, tender, and unexpectedly hilarious.'

* Marie Claire *

'Whiskey Tango Foxtrot gives us an insider's perspective of Afghanistan and Pakistan - their fascinating cultures, unstable governments, and burgeoning terrorist groups ... With dark, self-deprecating humour and shrewd insight, Barker chronicles her experiences as a rookie foreign reporter and the critical years when the Taliban resurged amidst the collapse of the Afghan and Pakistani governments.'

* The Daily Beast *



Book Information
ISBN 9781925228823
Author Kim Barker
Format Paperback
Page Count 320
Imprint Scribe Publications
Publisher Scribe Publications
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 129mm * 23mm