Looking for Trouble



I had never read or even heard of Ralph Peters when I sat down to watch CSPAN's BookTV a couple of weeks ago. What I was introduced to was a fascinating writer and thinker, journalist and novelist, who retired from the Army as a Lieutenant Colonel and has written nineteen books.
I was impressed by the interview and decided to read his latest collection of essays, Looking for Trouble: Adventures in a Broken World. This was a timely decision with Georgia and the Caucasus on the front pages this week, for the first essay in the book, June 1991: The Caucasus, describes the adventure of Ralph and his friend Captain Peter Zwack as they toured, illegally, through the then "Soviet" Armenia and into Georgia. The episode ends with an amusing but humane dinner with a Georgian named David who regales the two Americans with drinks, dinner, his mother and more in the capital city of Tbilisi. The rest of Peter's essay collection is just as exciting and fun with stops in Pakistan, the Kremlin, Mexico and elsewhere as he recounts dramatic escapades in this "Broken World". Any author who travels with a copy of Xenophon at his side is likely to be worth reading: I'm glad I've added the writings of Ralph Peters to my library and I expect to read more in the future.


Looking for Trouble: Adventures in a Broken World by Ralph Peters. Stackpole Books, Mechanicsburg, PA. 2008