The Camel Club

I just finished reading The Camel Club by David Baldacci. It is a fiction book centered around a mystery involving The White House, Secret Service, the NIC, and some guys who meet to discuss conspiracy theories and call themselves The Camel Club. The book is long - about 560 pages in paperback. Not only was the book a good story, it also gave me a lot to think about culturally and how folks outside the US view Americans. The story includes context of real life events like the war in Iraq and the struggle between the radial Muslims and the US. One character is a women who has moved to the US for the sole mission of sacraficing herself for Alah. She view Americans as excessive - excessive weight, excessive car size, excessive "stuff". She hates everything Americans stand for because she grew up with bombs falling all around and she lost all of her family members to violence. By the end of the story she does find herself envying the peace of American but still ends up sacraficing her life for the great cause. The book also talks about how Muslim countries are afraid of the US because of all of our fire power - this makes senses because they are surrounded by violence. As Americans we don't believe our country will resort to nuclear weapons but as a person growing up in this radical countries, they don't know that because all they know is violence. The book gave me a lot to think about as to how the world views Americans and while we take for granted our lifestyle, we really do have it great and should appreciate the little things in life and not live to excess. We should also take the time to understand the other cultures and viewpoints of the world - understand the history of those views and what has shaped their views for 100s of year. If you want a good read, I would definitely recommend this book because it tells a good story and leads you to think introspectively about our culture. Incidently, it is Book 1 of 29 on my 2007 list!