Rating: 
Summary: An amazing journey, but there is even more here
Review: The story is amazing enough, the likes of a good novel or film. The oddest couple ever - an impulsive American poet and an elderly Chinese Buddhist monk - set out on an improbable journey into Mongolia and Hong Kong to locate his late master's bones and conduct a proper ceremony over them. The back story is astonishing. This elderly monk escaped the Red Army as it marched on his monastery in 1959. He fled across thousands of miles during a period of intense famine - at one point clinging to a train through a tunnel so narrow it scraped the skin off his knuckles. He left his teacher behind to cope with the revolution. George Crane's account of that escape is vivid and, at times, horrifying. What else is wonderful about this book? The relationship between the writer and the monk, Tsung Tsai, is established with their meeting in Woodstock, New York, and steeped in their shared love of life and language. To read of them working together intensely to translate poetry from Chinese into English, catching one poet's appreciation and giving it like a precious gift to another language, is another rather miraculous event in the book.
Rating: 
Summary: Extraordinary, and yes, it's all true
Review: This astonishing book introduces us to Tsung Tsai, a Ch'an monk who, at 20, walked 2000 miles through the boneyards of Communist China with a book of poetry strapped to his chest. Somehow he wound up in Woodstock, New York, where he befriended poet, skeptic and seeker in spite of himself George Crane. (Both men are my neighbors, so I can assure the dubious reviewer of 10/25 that there really is a Tsung Tsai -- and that Crane's portrait of him is pitch-perfect.) Together they journeyed to Inner Monogolia, in a quixotic search for the mortal remains of Tsung Tsai's revered teacher that nearly cost both men their lives. This is a profound meditation on the human spirit in the guise of a page-turning adventure, a buddy book written in prose as clear as a temple bell. Crane conjures the landscape and textures of Inner Mongolia with strong, sure strokes, choosing just the right detail to capture the whole. I devoured this book and can't wait for his next.
Rating:
Summary: Down to earth spiritual
Review: This book describes the trip that 2 people from completely different cultures make to the roots of one of them. It is essentially a book about a friendship that crossed borders, cultures and generations. The author is an American not-really-good-for-anything poet in his forties, who has had a lot of different jobs, never really settling anywhere because his major love is writing poetry. His neighbour is an ascetic, noodle-eating monk, Tsung Tsai in his seventies who happens to be the only surviving monk of a monastery in Inner Mongolia where had to flee from in the fifties during Mao's prosecution of Buddhism. The monk's main wish is to go back to his home country, so after a lot of preparations they set out with a huge Buddha statue in their wake to bring this statue to its rightful place in Northern China. Where George worries all the time, Tsung Tsai puts his trust on the Buddha, and somehow thing always end up right. The highlight of the book is the gruelling climb of Crow Mountain, the place where Tsung Tsai's master had his retreat. Purely on inner strength Tsung Tsai makes it, but has to be carried off the mountain by one of the two guides. The book is a combination of history, poetry, philosophy, cultural differences, but above all friendship. The descriptions are sometimes hilarious, which makes the book very light even though the subject is sometimes quite heavy.
Rating:
Summary: 'Tis a great journey indeed
Review: This book is about true compassion and frendship. It is also the journey of someone who lives in this world but is not of it. It is how this great master can accomplish the seemingly impossible. The imagery is stunning throughout. It also shows how perseverance and devotion can accomplish miracles.
Rating:
Summary: The Real Thing
Review: This book is true, honest and from the heart. I don't think I need to say anymore.
Rating:
Summary: I laughed, I cried, I offered incense, I bowed.
Review: This book will have an honored place on my bookshelf next to Lama Govinda's 'The Way of the White Clouds', Lama David-Neel's 'Magic and Mystery in Tibet', John Blofeld's 'The Wheel of Life', and Peter Matthiessen's 'Nine Headed Dragon River'. It is a valuable record of the power and value of the Buddha Dharma for human life and endurance in this ocean-of-suffering world. But as much as I loved the book and felt it to be perfect as it is, I was left wishing for more insight into the teachings of Tsung Tsai's teacher. I surely hope that the omission of details about actual teachings is an indication of another book yet to come to complete this Dharma record. The chapter on the wayward ex-student of Tsung Tsai's is quite unique, very powerful and disturbing. Such an archetypal encounter seems lifted straight out of a Tolkien fantasy, yet it actually happened, amazing. The seductive temptations of the tantric/kundalini power are so graphically depicted. As well as the perennial worldly rewards of wealth and status to those infatuated with the charismatic aspects of spiritual power, in contrast to the poverty and renunciation of the true bhikku and their ministrations of healing power. Finally, I pay homage to the monks of Puuh Jih, 108 bows! May their tree of Dharma grow strong and provide comfort and shade for many suffering in this world of samsara!
Rating:
Summary: Secularist meets Buddha on his Way to Englightenment
Review: This book, to quote a passage, has as a "special feeling, special eye, and special heart". Its author, a secularists who quips at one point that he is in training to become a saint, meets a modern day Buddha, escapee from the purges of Mao's Communist China . The two of them go forth on an adventure to modern day China, a duty that must be done "hard-easy doesn't matter." The book is a moving adventure, spiritual quest, and wonderful buddy story, all rolled into one. A gift. A kindness.
Rating:
Summary: Bones a Masterful Dance
Review: This incandescent book held me enthralled from first page to last and left me wanting five more that I might not- for another week at least, have to leave the company of these two men. I literally could not put it down. My daughter ate cereal for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The writing is strong and clear as a mountain stream and the dance between the story and the teller mesmerizing. I was transported to a world I did not want to leave and have been left with a powerful residue. It is a great- as in larger than life- story, timeless and beautiful....I am larger for having read it.
Rating: 
Summary: Good but not great
Review: This is a great story and it'd make a great movie. Unfortunately, the author and his writing ability are not up to the task and, by the end of the book, I was wishing he'd just shut up and let the monk talk.
Rating:
Summary: Informative and easy reading
Review: This is a very good book, but I am going to stop short of the glowing praise others have given it. While in some respects George Crane's use of descriptive language is excellent, I think it fell short more often than not. Nonetheless, I found the book was paced well, and very informative not only about the Ch'an monks of Inner Mongolia, but of the period in Maoist China known as The Great Leap Forward. The most stunning part of the book I found was the description of Tsung Tsai's exodus from China, particularly his train ride.
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