Books about Mongolia

Following on from a thread on another website I've just been thinking about books available as an introduction to Mongolia. There are many out there but the info below links to some of my favourites...

Yep, 'Last Disco' and 'Wild East' are dated, 'Dragon Hunter' is a great book but not really relevant to today - does have some insight into the local character but from a fairly colonial viewpoint.

‘Edge of Blue Heaven’ by Benedict Allen is a good read and has some good pictures, it is about Benedict’s journey by horse, camel and foot around Mongolia. I particularly like his comments about how long a vegetarian would survive on the nomad diet but wouldn’t want to be one of his pack-animals who he seems to have a habit of killing-off… A friend found me a second-hand edition hard-back, don’t know if it’s still available, check amazon.co.uk as it’s a Brit publication.

There is a series of pictorial maps/satellite images published by a N American foundation called Conservation Ink for 4 of the protected areas in Mongolia which are excellent introductions to the localities. You can order them from the foundation for 8 USD each (www.conservationink.org) or you can order them from www.shopmongolia.com for 18 USD each (ho, ho, ho…)

For other insights into the park areas there is a great series of guide books published in association with a German agency www.eco-nature-edition.com. They give very good information on several of the park areas including flora, fauna and issues with integrating nomads and wildlife conservation. They are probably the best thing if you want to know what type of bush you are sheltering from the sun under and the name of the lizard that just scrabbled away in the sand. I seem to remember more guides than are shown on their website, which seems a bit dated. All are available in English, probably German and some have even been translated into Japanese. Fairly easy to pick up in UB when you get to Mongolia.

PS

I just found www.mongoleionline.de - check it out as a great source of Mongolian hard to get books in Europe. I have to order "Imperial Mongolian Cooking" to see if it's for real or not...