The Storied City: The Quest for Timbuktu and the Fantastic Mission to Save Its Past

by Charlie English

Two tales of a city: The historical race to -discover- one of the world's most mythologized places, and the story of how a contemporary band of archivists and librarians, fighting to save its ancient manuscripts from destruction at the hands of al Qaeda, added another layer to the legend.

To Westerners, the name -Timbuktu- long conjured a tantalizing paradise, an African El Dorado where even the slaves wore gold. Beginning in the late eighteenth century, a series of explorers gripped by the fever for -discovery- tried repeatedly to reach the fabled city. But one expedition after another went disastrously awry, succumbing to attack, the climate, and disease. Timbuktu was rich in another way too. A medieval center of learning, it was home to tens of thousands--according to some, hundreds of thousands--of ancient manuscripts, on subjects ranging from religion to poetry, law to history, pharmacology, and astronomy. When al-Qaeda-linked jihadists surged across Mali in 2012, threatening the existence of these precious documents, a remarkable thing happened: a team of librarians and archivists joined forces to spirit the manuscripts into hiding.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Africa, Travel, Books About Books, Mali, Adventure

416 pages, Hardcover

First published May 2, 2017

About the author

Charlie English is a British non-fiction author and former head of international news at the Guardian. He has written four critically-acclaimed books: The Snow Tourist (2008); The Book Smugglers of Timbuktu (2017, published in the US as The Storied City); and The Gallery of Miracles and Madness (2021). His latest, The CIA Book Club, has just been published. He lives in London with his family and a rather talented sheepdog named Enzo. You can reach Charlie through his website, or via X or Instagram at @charlieenglish1.

Reviews

[Daren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hints of spoilers below, so read on only if you know about this, or don't mind some discussion around the edges.

Timbuktu - it really is a magical name for a city, one that conjures up such strong impressions of the wild, inaccessible African El Dorado. It is a place that captivates the imagination, it is a city so well recognised for the lack of knowledge about it, which is quite ironic. Timbuktu was also a historic Islamic centre of learning and religion - a fact discovered by the West only a long time after its heyday.

Congratulations me, I read a book only a little more than a year after it was published, this is quite a rare event. I was gifted an on0line book voucher and the shop had only limited stock available and this captured my imagination.

I found it an excellent read - well put together with an easy structure. It basically runs two narratives, going chapter about. The first is the titular theme - the rescue of the hundreds of thousands (*) of ancient manuscripts stored in the official and private libraries of collectors which were at risk (*) from the al-Qaeda-linked jihadists from 2012 to 2015. The secondary theme is covers the western exploration of (or to) Timbuktu - going back to 1788, when Africa was in fashion, and not well explored. Joseph Banks with other members of the Royal Society formed the Africa Association - and they advertised for explorers to fulfil exploration missions.

Africa had previously been written off as the continent which had no recorded history - where people had no learning to pass down. And yet historic stories of the wealth of Timbuktu had been massively exaggerated, Timbuktu was to change that.

Successive chapters move both story lines forward a little at a time, until they come together at the end of the book.

There are some twists and turns, and some well explained concise history. The book smugglers theme has a rather well telegraphed twist, which is not necessarily resolved by this book - something other reviewers have identified as an issue. It wasn't such an issue for me. The exploration theme tells some wonderful stories - some already well known, some less so, but all entertaining. The mix if right for me - not so much detail that the exploration stories get bogged down, but not so little that it reads as an outline.

My only complaint, and I don't know how this could be resolved better - is that many of the people featured in the book have similar names, and it can be pretty confusing with the who is who.

Overall easy to read, well organised and enjoyable.

4 stars.

* - maybe!

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

The city of Timbuktu with its ancient history has long captivated people. Just the very name conjures up images of an oasis in the desert, a city full of exotic people and a place where the mysteries of the East meet the gateway to the dark continent of Africa. It is a place that drew travellers in the Eighteenth century seeking the legendary place where even the slaves wore gold, but the desire to reach there was not always met with success, history shows us that the roads there were littered with failed expeditions as they succumbed to the hostile landscape, disease and attack.

There is another side to Timbuktu, it has always been a world centre in the Islamic world for learning from as far back as the 13th Century. As they became a centre where knowledge was pooled. This has left a lasting legacy of thousands and thousands of documents, books and manuscripts in public and personal libraries throughout the city on subjects as diverse as astronomy, religion, law and history as well as cultural subjects like poetry. These vast libraries came under threat from destruction in 2012 as al-Qaeda–linked jihadists poured across Mali wreaking havoc and destruction as they went. After destroying several mausoleums the librarians and archivists of the city were forced to consider the fate of their precious papers. So began the race to either hide the manuscripts or in the case of large collections, to move them to another city where they would be safe.

At times this reads like a thriller, as he tells the stories of how the manuscripts were moved from Timbuktu to a place of safety in Bamako using secure networks of couriers. Much of it was carried out in secret as the least amount of people that knew about it, the safer the operation. Charlie English recounts the stories he’d been told, before travelling to the city to see for himself the lockers and their precious cargoes. Whilst I think that it was important to set the context, for me it felt like there was too much emphasis on the past events. I didn’t like the switching around of the old and the new, I would have preferred the current day and historical events to be in separate sections. With its history, contemporary world issues and focus on ancient books, it is a difficult book to pigeonhole. It is a fascinating and very readable account of a small but significant part of world history.

[oshizu · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars. I began this book on May 17, 2019, so it's taken literally a year to finish it.
There's several reasons I found this book a bit of a slog, despite the author's extensive research.
One, it should be retitled "The European Quest for Timbuktu" as a good half of the book focuses on European efforts to map, exploit, and colonize the Niger region. So, after all, it wasn't actually a history "about what is now Mali."
Two, at the very end of the book, the author threw shade on the veracity of the account of the "fantastic mission to save [Timbuktu's] past." Yes, yes, we all know that all historiography is merely another form of fictional narrative that dresses itself in authenticity but still....disappointing ending.

[Andy · Rating 4 out of 5]

read as part of 2018 Irish Meridians Challenge

fascinating,
switching between early European searches for the city of Timbuktu and 21st century struggles to preserve the culture in the face of extremists

at every point we shift along a spectrum from inflated expectations to low ones

early adventurers were spurred desire to discover a trading city, a city of immense riches, and later by European colonial and commercial ambitions.
Laing, Mungo Park, Barth

most early expeditions ended in failure and death

eventually reaching the city it appears to them as backwards and primitive
there is a rich cultural and literary history in the west African region, but this is mostly dismissed as the Europeans move to conquest and a desire to portray the people as barbaric, uncultured and in need of western intervention

the modern day tale of a region falling under fundamentalist control, with the imposition of sharia and the influence of al qaeda, raises the prospect of the caches of historical manuscripts being destroyed, especially those that do not gel with the particulars of the fundamentalists beliefs

get a good view of a local muslim population's resistance to the erosion of their freedoms, albeit a second hand account

details of three individual custodians/librarians/collectors efforts to hide the thousands of manuscripts and eventually with hard won western aid to smuggle them to safety

again he pendulum swings, at first most are believed to have been destroyed, until details of the efforts to save them emerge, then as money pours in to preserve them the volume of manuscripts grows to the hundreds of thousands, but there are suggestions that the system is being gamed and numbers being inflated to get more funds

even in the modern era, hard facts are elusive and we have to accept some ambiguity and misinformation

[Anetq · Rating 2 out of 5]

This promises an action adventure, but the level of detail, people, historic events and tales are borrowing the tale of the rescue mission under a mountain of details. At first I thought it was just trying to stretch it into a full book, that we had to go through every single European Africa society and the biography of the explorers they sent off to find Timbuktu - in alternating chapters with the "real story" of the mission to rescue the many ancient manuscripts of Timbuktu (and of the few, if not the only written source of Africas scholarly heritage going back to the 12th or 13th century) - much is at stake, this should be a great story... But then we need the entire history of the different jihadist fractions and islamic state (who are posing the threat to the manuscripts). And then there are the long-winding tales of moving metal lockers across the desert in wartime, and the applications for funding, and the meetings discussing the possible funding, and the meetings with warlords holding couriers and manuscripts hostage. This would make a great 1:30h action movie, but in stead it turned into boringly detailed accounts - only in the last chapter do the level of detail finally make sense as the author tried to find out how much of this was true - how many manuscripts were there really? How many were moved during wartime? Did the European donors get ripped off with false claims of kidnappers and a vast overestimate of the number of manuscripts? There are sadly no real answers, nor any clear indication of the manuscripts' future - and the research into this valuable heritage - only a naive disappointment that the "history books" turned out to be garnished and altered to suit the powers that be, when they were written hundred of years after the event they portray. I am very sure that is the case for many a historic account written during the middle ages anywhere, so it seems weird to dismiss them for that reason?! This book is a weird mess, the lack of timeline makes it really hard to get through, so yeah... maybe read another account of this fascinating historic event and the mystical city of Timbuktu.

[Tariq Mahmood · Rating 4 out of 5]

I never realised how much Muslims were fascinated and respected the written word till I changed about this riveting story. Timbuktu could be the home of the world's earliest university, a seat of learning where some of the giants of knowledge debated and wrote on rocks, leather and paper. Over the period of time these learned men and their university disappeared, leaving behind only fables and heritage which their loyal children clung to, out of respect and honour. They might not be able to know what to do with the chronicles but they will still gaurd them with their life as it is their tradition. They have successfully fought off many conquerors, the latest of which are the jihadists. This book is a detailed story of the struggle to save their beloved scriptures. So not only have these brave African Muslims demonstrated great courage but also shown the world the capability of clinging onto their cultural tradition. But it seems they do not still know what to do with these historical scriptures for they do not provide unfettered access to academics to chronicle these valuable historical documents so the wider world can benefit. Isn't it time for the whole world to benefit from this valuable history?

[Andrew H · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ultimately, a rather mixed book. The book divides into two time-frames, one investigates the history of Timbuktu, the other describes the attempt to rescue valuable manuscripts from the Taliban and fundamentalist Islam. In theory the two narratives connect, one building up the mythology of Timbuktu and the other relating the facts of Timbuktu today. In reality, however, this is not the case. The concluding chapter leaves the synthesis undone-- but with a hope that a "psychogeography" might do this in the future.

The historical sections of the book are narrated with wit and a tongue-in-cheek attitude, which is exactly right for the nonsense that passed as geographical writing in previous centuries. English creates some compelling vignettes. The modern day vignettes are not as interesting, though, and there isn't much for a reader to absorb beyond the sheer philistinism of extreme Islam towards its cultural roots.

This is an important book-- the Timbuktu manuscripts reversed academic teaching which believed that African history was merely oral. Henry Gates Jr wept when he saw the manuscripts, but a reader is not given any such sense of awe. No manuscripts are discussed. None are shown. Nothing is revealed about the literary manuscripts. At one point, English rather profoundly states that the literary nature of the Timbuktu manuscripts has been undervalued: with this in mind, it would have been interesting to see evidence! More time should have been given to describing the revolutionary nature of the manuscripts and why saving them was so vital for civilisation. Consequently, the book is a bit of a boys' own story across the centuries, with a lot of plotting, and daring, and works on that level.

[blue · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just one note: the research done for this book is fucking amazing - as it should be.

[Catherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book! The history, in and of itself was mind-boggling. I am very impressed with this author and the research they put into this project. Bravo!!!

[Calzean · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting way of telling two stories. The first about the various European attempts to explore West Africa, the fixation of the mysterious city of Timbuktu and their eventual invasion. The second is the more recent efforts of the librarians and protectors of Timbuktu's wealth of ancient manuscripts who were able to prevent their destruction by Islamic fundamentalists.
This is well written, well researched and told me about the written African histories that I had not known existed.

[Hella · Rating 5 out of 5]

Zegeningen van het recensentschap! Dit boek was anders nooit in mijn blikveld verschenen, en wat was ik dan een stuk minder wijs geweest. Timboektoe heeft voor mij – voor iedereen, denk ik – altijd een mythische klank gehad. Ooit dacht ik dat ik er ooit wel eens komen zou, nu denk ik dat ik dat voor een volgend leven moet bewaren. En wat is het dan heerlijk om er zo uitgebreid over te lezen. Want het boek is niet alleen een Indiana-Jones-verslag van een een spectaculaire reddingsoperatie (waarbij minister Ploumen en het Prins Clausfonds een grote rol spelen), het geeft ook een overzicht van alle Europese ontdekkingsreizen die erheen georganiseerd zijn, en wat daarvan de invloed is geweest op de blanke visie van het zwarte land.
Dat vond ik zo bijzonder! De vroege ontdekkingsreizigers kwamen erachter dat in Timboektoe een rijke cultuur was geweest, waarvan nog steeds honderden oude handschriften (de oudste uit de twaalfde eeuw) en nog levende geleerden getuigden. In het begin vond men dat in Europa wel interessant en exotisch, maar toen men met koloniale blik naar Afrika ging kijken, veranderde dat. Om te kunnen ("mogen") koloniseren, moet je jezelf ervan overtuigen dat het land in kwestie geschiedenisloos is, stenentijdperkig, en alleen maar kan profiteren van de blanke zegeningen. (The white man's burden, en meer van zulks fraais.)
Het zou tot na de Tweede Wereldoorlog duren voor men opnieuw 'ontdekte' dat de Europese visie op Afrika niet klopte. Er werd wetenschappelijk onderzoek gedaan, en Unesco maakte geld vrij voor het beheer van de oude handschriften van Timboektoe. Ook Zuid-Afrika zag hier een kans om het werelddeel in de vaart der volkeren op te stoten.
Mooie tijden, waaraan een einde komt met de jihadistische bezetting van Timboektoe in 2012. Die duurde nog geen jaar, maar er werd veel vernield. Ik zoek er het een en ander over op, en vind ook een film die hierover gemaakt is, en die ik zeker wil zien!
Al met al een boek dat alles heeft: een spannend verhaal, nog meer spannende verhalen over al die ontdekkingsreizigers en hun ontberingen, en een – voor mij - nieuw inzicht in een oude wereld. Virtueel reizen is ook verrukkelijk.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author cleverly sets out two separate narratives. The first describes the various European explorers who set out to “discover” Timbuktu, drawn by a self generating mythology. The second describes the various efforts by the book owners of Timbuktu to rescue their manuscripts from Islamic fundamentalists.

At the very end the author brings these two strands together and in doing so brings all the themes of culture, bravery, western projections and flawed narratives into a most pleasing relief.

[Vicky Hunt · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Storied Past

In an Indiana Jones type adventure story, Charlie English weaves a narrative mixed with history between the centuries of exploration in and around Mali. I can not think of a better title for this book than that of Timbuktu being a storied city, given the subject of the book. The title is very clear and succinct, but there is much to say on this simple topic. But first, imagine away with me:

Imagine a future where the North American continent is under occupation by a new power, instead of the current United States and Canadian governments. You may choose to include Mexico, or not. But, that government would not be a 'foreign' power. It would then be local. Possession is said to be nine tenths of the law for a reason. We have an extensive written h-i-s-t-o-r-y in our countries here, though it only covers a period of two and a half centuries. It is, for better or worse, the sum total of the history we are taught in schools. We do not really learn much world history in school because we value history only in as much as it relates to US.

Likewise, a new power would not value our 'version' of history. History is really only our version of what happened anyways. "Power X," as I will call them, would have a vested interest in getting rid of and/or rewriting history books to create a popular history that would give their new government a sense of legitimacy here among the newly conquered people of our land. Language and culture is not all that would have to change over time. His-story itself would have to change to accommodate the new story unfolding.

Imagine the number of people who would rush to hide books. Can you conceive of a story that you would want your children's children to possess, despite what they are told by the conquerors? Books tell stories. So do tombstones. But, gravestones are usually not destroyed in an occupation, unless by the bombing itself.

Back to reality now, snap out of it. This book is essentially about how the country of Mali, and the literary city of Timbuktu adapted to conquerors and occupations. Timbuktu is a city surrounded by mystery and legend. Many scholars think of it as a former University city of the Songhai Empire during the 15th Century and before. Some Songhai legend holds that former kings built a navy and sailed across the Atlantic to colonize South America. Some even believe that the Aztec race may have been a descent from the ancient Timbuktians. It was stated here that The Mali race is a mixture of the Arab and Black Sudanese races, producing a red skinned race.

Whatever the truth behind the many conjectures of the past, some facts exist. Thousands of ancient manuscripts were saved from Timbuktu's rich literary history over the centuries. During the Moroccan occupation of Mali, many of them were rewritten to show what the rulers wanted them to show. This is evident from very recent reading of ancient gravestones found in the city today. Those ancient manuscripts were again evacuated from the city in the twentieth century when Jihadists invaded the city, and forced Shariah Law on the populace. These manuscripts consist largely of records, documents, bills of sale, deeds, books, and scholarly works, the bulk of which are religious in nature.

Today, the huge collection of manuscripts reveal the fact that Africa was not a 'dark continent' without a written history when Europeans began to raid and pillage the continent during the so-called "Scramble for Africa." It was done on the same manner that Central and South America were conquered. The found texts and culture were destroyed to perpetuate the myth that the natives were a few tech levels behind the invaders, and hence were being served a favor by being 'uplifted' to modern conditions. (Never mind that they are in worse conditions than ever now.)

The ideas in this book have a huge bearing for all of us, on multiple levels. We are not black or white in a vacuum. Race delineation is relative. I am only white because you are black. You are only black because I am white. And, if we were not black and white, we would just be people together. The facts of the book shed light on what West Africa was like before the invaders and terrorists rampaged the land.

I particularly enjoyed the section on the invasion of the Songhai Empire by Ahmad al-Mansur of Morocco. At that time the Songhai were ruled by descendants of Askia the Great. I read this book for my stop in Mali on my Journey Around the World in 2019. I enjoyed the Audible narrated by Enn Reitel in excellent voice. My next stop will be in Senegal, where I will read Fisherman's Blues: A West African Community at Sea by Anna Badkhan. Then on to the Gambia where I will read Roots (the book... I've seen the mini-series multiple times) for the first time. I have so much of Africa left to explore!

"The traveler makes unexpected friends abroad, and finds unexpected hostility at home."

"The mysterious was nothing, if not obliging."

[Karolina Sosnowska · Rating 2 out of 5]

https://tanayahczyta.wordpress.com/20...

[J.J. · Rating 2 out of 5]

Was kind of one of elusive squid books. You invested all this time to find out what happened and then it closed with but did it?!

[Kirsty · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting snipits of the history of Europeans' first interactions with Western Africa and the Niger region. I didn't know anything about the MNLA or jihadist presence in Timbuktu in the 2010s either, so that was interesting to read about. Good book.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was given to me by a family member as an Xmas present. Otherwise, admittedly knowing nothing about Timbuktu and its history and having other more pressing issues and topics to read about I probably never would have read it.

On the one hand, I am glad I did. I learned a tremendous amount about the history of European efforts to find the city. In the course of relating that history in a highly readable, narrative, journalistic rather than academic style the author taught me as much about European prejudice, and ignorance as about Islamic culture over the ages. I came away very impressed with the extent to which the people there built and sustained empires of political and intellectual power for centuries.

On the other hand, there were aspects of the book which I found to be lacking. The maps were poorly done. Many locations noted in the text of the book were not shown on the maps. It was also cumbersome to have to flip back and forth from the text to the front of the book where the maps were. More maps at the beginning of each chapter about the explorers would have been much more user friendly.

The portraits and photos were good. More of them would have been even better. The city seemed so exotic, if not alien, that some depictions of what it might have looked like over the centuries would have been helpful. Some portrait painting of the explorers and photos of the current day people described in the book were included. More would have been better.

As with any book which provides a broad and sweeping history of a place and its people covering a long period of time there are A LOT of names, dates, and places to try to recall. For the more serious history reader it might require a second reading or follow up with some of the books noted in the references. For a more casual reader like me one can come away with a pretty clear sense of patterns and trends as well as a new found appreciation of just how sophisticated the cultures were in that part of Africa hundreds of years ago.

Overall it is a well researched and readable book that others like me who know nothing about the city's history and culture will probably find worthwhile.

[Mary Rita · Rating 4 out of 5]

Surprise Ending?

Throughout the telling of the parallel stories about the exploration of Timbuktu and manuscript creation, the author faithfully recounts what he gathered from historical texts and reliable modern sources. I found these histories fascinating, though difficult to follow at times due to the foreign sounding names and places. Thank goodness I was reading on Kindle. I made extensive use of the find in text features to remind me of the people, places, and relationships.

The author writes very diplomatic ending implying that just as the exaggerated tales of gold covered buildings in Timbuktu were found to be overrated legend, some aspects of the importance and evacuation of Timbuktu's documents are likely exaggerated. However, this should not deter anyone from reading the collection of ancient and modern adventures. Nor should we underestimate the value and validity of the thousands of preserved documents. We should remember that ancient story-tellers were just as likely to exaggerate as modern sources. The real truth of the literate cultures of ancient Western Africa should be marveled and believed to be true. Just remember that history is written by the victors, who face the option to rewrite ancient history to conform with their own view of their present importance.

Overall this is an amazing story that has been largely ignored in our Euro-centric history books.

[Nicky · Rating 2 out of 5]

Reviewed for the Bibliophibian.

This story is, in general, more impressive until you get to the bit at the end where doubt is cast on the veracity of some of the modern stories. It feels really cheap to get to the end and read this critique that suggests things presented as fact never occurred, and the things that do appear to have been true may be rather overexaggerated. It feels dishonest in a way that it wouldn’t have done if these critiques were presented side by side with the accounts, and it makes me wonder about the author’s integrity in the other parts of the book as well.

I mean, reading it credulously, it’s a heck of a story and these people are heroes. And surely, surely, you think, the author must have done his research to verify these accounts as far as possible. And then you find out, well, he did, but he didn’t feel like saying so at the time.

Tell the story, by all means. It’s a heck of a story after all, and it remains absorbing even if you know there are questions about it — but if you only know that at the end and look back, well, it all seems a bit of a sham, and can you really trust the author to tell the ancient story straight?

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

To Westerners, Timbuktoo has always had legendary status. Indeed, when I told a friend that I was reading this book, she asked if it was a real place. The author, Charlie English, himself, states 'I imagine Timbuktoo's story as a series of myths and corrections laid down one on top of the other'. While substantially telling the story of the saving of ancient manuscripts from destruction by jihadists in 2012, he also examines many of the myths that surround this place and their origins.
There are two major narratives that alternate in the book. The first, the saving of the manuscripts, and the second, the 'exploration and discovery' of Timbuktoo by British and French adventurers in the 18th and 19th centuries, prompted by the belief that there were riches to be had by colonisation of this remote place. Many of them suffered greatly and died in the process.
While it is an interesting story, it is a sometimes confusing read. Many of the names are similar and it is hard to keep track of who is who and where we are at in the story. It also leaves us with an ongoing debate as to how the whole salvage operation was run, how many manuscripts there really are, and what constitutes a manuscript?

[Ashley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Excellent research by author into a subject completely unknown to me. Found book difficult to read due to the flipping back and forth in the past and present (which normally is not an issue for me) but even the past did not stay chronological (or so it felt) and the dates and places plus the names really threw me. This is not a book you can put down and come back to in a few days unless you have an incredible memory. The length of characters is enormous and the names are unfamiliar to me so seem very similar in nature and it’s hard to tell people apart. The history is rich and fascinating though and the mystery of the manuscripts and how families hid them and brought them to safety during the attacks over ge years is amazing.

[Roy Elmer · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Book Smugglers of Timbuktu is a genuinely fascinating piece of both investigative journalism and narrative history. The author, Charlie English, seamlessly weaves a thousand years of myth and history on the heart of Africa, with the (possibly exaggerated) tale of some astonishingly brave librarians in the time of a Jihadist occupation.

The historical elements are thoroughly researched, well documented and, in what is the greatest compliment you can give to this sort of popular history, it reads as if you're having a chat with the author in the pub. The exploration of the past of Timbuktu, and actually, more than that, of European mythologising (some good, some horrifically racially motivated in nature) is well wrought from start to finish, and none of the detail, nor non of the flourish, feels superfluous at any stage.

The journalistic, semi-biographical account of Timbuktu's brave librarians doesn't quite flow in the same way. The cast of real people are fascinating, their tales read like (as the author puts it) real life Indiana Jones yarns, but, even in the face of all of the strife that they dealt with during the Jihadist occupation of their city, their experiences still did not feel as if they were entirely written in their own words. There are value judgements here, small ones, I grant you, but they undermine the sheer bravery of the act undertaken by the librarians with a pulling out of the rug from under an act that they should, quite rightly, be proud of.

I would definitely recommend this book. Both elements of it, in fact. This is a fascinating story that I had no idea about, and I don't recall it appearing in the news at the time, so please pick this up, become engrossed in the history, and critically appraise everything. This is honestly worth the price of admission.

[Diane · Rating 5 out of 5]

The title was what caught my attention first as I remembered this event being in the news. After Al-Quedda took over Timbuctu in Mali there was a frantic rush to save all the manuscripts and texts in the mosque and the city. This is the story of how they were hidden and saved from the illiterate idiots with AK47s. However it is also the story of the white colonisation of Africa with the appalling arrogant assumption that there was no written or intellectual African history until the white men arrived. Each chapter on the history of the men who tried to reach Timbuctu and the follow the course of the Niger River is alternated with following the story of the men who conspired to save the documents in 2012. It makes for riveting, informative reading. While we cannot now honour the motives of the men who ‘invaded’ these sub Saharan countries in search of gold, ivory and slaves, we can agree that they were brave and adventurous.
What I didn’t realise was that there was a controversy after Al-Quedda was defeated about exactly where the saved manuscripts were being kept and how many of them there were originally. This is a well researched and thoroughly fascinating study of more than just one moment in 21st C African history.

[Julian Walker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Weaving together two strands of centuries-apart history really works, as does the author's blending of ancient and modern beliefs surrounding a city whose very name still conjures up images of mystery and adventure.

Written with pace and imagination, as might be expected of a seasoned journalist, this is a great tale of what was, what is, and what might have been, from the perspective of people on the ground and those far away from the reality (both in thinking and physically).

A luxuriant tale, skillfully and engagingly unveiled.

Terrific stuff.

[Mark Latchford · Rating 4 out of 5]

A saga worth communicating; a history well told. Having visited Timbuktu just before it fell to the Islamists this book was always going to be very interesting to me but English has researched forensically and narrated smoothly. A good read about a great continent.

[GWEN WATSON]

Very interesting

[Richard Marney · Rating 5 out of 5]

An riveting story of rescuing priceless Islamic manuscripts from mindless jihadists.

An uplifting tale to make one forget temporarily the turmoil of 2022 and redeem faith in we human folk!!

[Kyla M · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great piece of investigative journalism about a piece of history not widely known. Those who wrote that this is too European focused are missing the point of the book - that was the only available documentation for a long time and sets the specific context of future exploitation of Africa (although of course this is only one perspective).

[Sophia Levy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one has been sitting on my bedside table for months. A bit dry in places, but I’m glad I read it. A great insight into a place name we’ve all heard but know nothing about.

[Lori Tatar · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Storied City: The Quest for Timbuktu and the Fantastic Mission to Save Its Past by Charlie English paves the way toward understanding the differences between Westerners and other cultures, particularly Arabian. It explores multiple expeditions fraught with all kinds of peril from disease to hunger, murder to insufficient water. Attempts to discover and exploit a whole other, seemingly hidden culture and city are met with tremendous resistance from men as well as from environmental factors.

The book blends early travels with current sentiments and hardships on both sides as it takes the reader on a journey for a destination very similar to El Dorado, with similar findings once discovered. Timbuktu has always had an identity of its own, full of beauty, mystery and secrets. Very few outsiders get to know her. This history offers great insight into understanding why.