Three cups of tea One man's mission to promote peace -- one school at a time

IN September 1993, cold, hungry and lost after a failed ascent of K2, Greg Mortenson stumbled into the village of Korphe, Pakistan. His misstep forever changed the lives of thousands of Pakistani and Afghan children. In gratitude to the people of the village who helped him, Mortenson vowed to build a school for their children, who were studying in the open air, scratching in the mud with sticks. Keeping that vow turned Mortenson - a laid-back drifter, emergency nurse by profession and climber by avocation - into a driven fund-raiser who helped found, and now directs, the Central Asia Institute. Mortenson didn't stop with one school: realizing how desperately children in the region needed education, he traveled to the remotest outposts of Pakistan and Afghanistan to create more. His foundation has built 78 schools, which have educated 28,000 children, including more than 18,000 girls, who had rarely received an education before. This story is familiar by now to the 1.2 million adults who have kept Mortenson's book "Three Cups of Tea" on the bestseller list for more than two years. The success of his book has led to these two new versions for young readers. "Listen to the Wind" tells Mortenson's story in the clear, succinct voices of the children of Korphe. Leaving out background and history, the picture-book version is nevertheless true to the spirit of Mortenson's experience and mission. The minimal text is splendidly paired with Susan L. Roth's textural, earth-toned collages, which evoke the roughness of the terrain and the primitive quality of life there. A community spirit pervades: on nearly every spread, we see the multitude of villagers (girls in colorful headscarves; dark-haired boys) who worked with Mortenson to build their school. "Our mothers carried water to mix the cement. . . . With our small fingers we wedged tiny slivers of stones into the cement to make the walls stronger." The raw quality of the art is counterbalanced by a "Korphe Scrapbook" of color photos documenting the people and places, helping answer a child's question: Is this true? "Three Cups of Tea: Young Readers Edition" aims to stay faithful to Mortenson's story and to inspire readers. It is chockfull of extras, including an introduction by Jane Goodall, a timeline, a glossary, a "who's who" and a lengthy, affecting interview with Mortenson's 12-year-old daughter, Amira. Framed by so many elements, however, the story itself loses impact. Boldface vocabulary words direct readers to the glossary but are distracting and create an off-putting textbook aura. In her pared-down version, Sarah Thomson has kept the pacing and the cast of characters intact, but flat renditions of events like Mortenson's armed kidnapping, just weeks before the birth of his daughter, fail to capture the power of the original. Yet this edition is valuable: Children have contributed in practical ways to Mortenson's mission, and there is no shyness here about calling them to action. Krystyna Poray Goddu's most recent book is "Dollmakers and Their Stories."

Greg Mortenson and coauthor David Oliver Relin recount Mortenson's crossroad and what he did about it. After a near fatal attempt to climb Himalayan peak K2, Mortenson was nursed and sheltered by villagers in a remote area of Pakistan. Following his recovery, he promised to return and build the village its first school. That project has now grown to include more than 50 schools across Pakistan and Afghanistan, with a particular focus to bring educational opportunities to young girls. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.