Rating: 
Summary: A very personal view
Review: The author is unusually honest in admitting he does not know much about Albania and misunderstands a lot of what he sees. The bandits turn out to be harmless children, etc. This makes for a disarming book and an absorbing picture of a country wrecked first by dictatorship and then by chaos. He meets dozens of Albanians of many ages and backgrounds and describes how they cope with the circumstances in which they have to live. Most of his descriptions are sympathetic and he tries to imagine himself in their shoes. I repectfully suggest the reviewers who found the author arrogant are misunderstanding the book. There is hardly a single person in it whom the author dislikes. Strongly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: This book tells only bad stories about Albania
Review: The author realy seems to be proud of himself that he has survived Albania. I agree that not everything in Albania is perfect, but who wants to read stories about how lucky the author is that he wasn't killed and that since WWII no other foreigners has visited a place. Sometimes, you have the impression that the author really believes that he is one of the first foreigners to visit the country and not to travel back in a coffin. The book is another example of writings about Albania only mentioning the bad points because these things sell better. There are other critical books about the country much more worth to be read (e.g. Post's Women in Albania).
Rating:
Summary: This Accursed Book
Review: The first time I visited Albania there were no guidebooks available. I read some history books, but the most recent one available then was published in 1978. The year was 1992 and the country had just opened up to foreigners. Living within swimming distance, in Corfu, Greece, from 1972-1974 had piqued my curiosity. At that time, no Americans were allowed to visit, due to the harsh policies of Enver Hoxha's severely Stalinist regime. So my first trip to Albania was like jumping backward off a cliff: I had no idea what to expect until I landed. Once there, the beauty of the country and the generosity of the people blew me away. I am a photographer and in Albania I found my life's work, beginning a project to document the Albanian people, including those living in Kosova and Macedonia. Since 1992 I have spent almost a month each year in this region. I had looked forward to reading Robert Carver's "The Accursed Mountains", but found so many inaccuracies and author prejudices that I could not possibly recommend this book to anyone seeking to learn more about Albania. The author overuses such qualifiers as "reputed", "it was said", "widely believed" and "claimed". Was there no way he could have found out if these statements were true or not? The more I read of this book, the more annoyed I became. I was in Albania in 1996, the same year he wrote about, and it was hard to believe that we had traveled in the same country. Whereas he continually met "unsmiling" people wanting to rip him off, I had totally different experiences. Strangers invited me into their homes, fed me and put me up for the night-and refused to accept one lek for their kindness. Some of his inaccuracies: "Fifty thousand green card visas had been allocated to Albania on a lottery basis..." (p. 24):
50,000 is the total number of visas granted to all the countries allowed to apply, not just Albania. "Maps only became legal in 1995...There weren't any for sale anywhere." (p. 29)
I was able to purchase a map of Albania at a kiosk in Skanderbeg Square in 1993. "There was no driving test in Albania. You just paid the police $10 for a permit. Spectacular crashes were common." (p. 39)
Why not mention that, until 1991, most Albanians were not allowed to own a car? Wouldn't that be an interesting fact to impart? "There was only one ship left [in Saranda]...a small rusted freighter" (p. 99)
That's strange, because, along with Durres and Vlore, Saranda is a major port and every time I've been there I've seen quite a few boats of all types in the harbor: Freighters, ferries that travel back and forth from Corfu, and fishing boats, among others. "The police were out in force...collecting cash [bribes from bus drivers]" (p. 115).
I have traveled extensively on buses in Albania, and never was stopped for this reason. "For Macedonia, you had to have a passport with no Greek stamps at all, or they wouldn't let you in." (p. 133)
Funny, but the Greek stamps on my passport have never kept me out of Macedonia. "The US Treasury had apparently put five hidden raised serrations on each bill...to detect forgeries" (p. 150)
Please, can someone tell me when this was done? "...my mistake was to risk taking a photo of the giant equestrian statue of Skanderbeg...Now is a bad time for people with cameras." (p. 157-162)
I have never had a problem taking photos anywhere in Albania. In pre-war Kosova, yes; the Serbs liked throwing their weight around. But in 1996 I was working on a project concerned with the fate of political prisoners in Albania and was able to photograph in former and current prisons and other places that would have been forbidden during the Hoxha regime. "If a foreigner got a cab it cost $50 [to go to Rinas Airport]." (p. 328)
I have never paid more than $20, either coming or going from Rinas, until 2003, when the lek became based on the euro instead of the US dollar. What bothered me most about this book was the author's treatment of women. It's obvious that he cares very little for feminists. However, he has no problem in describing the size ("enormous") of a woman's breasts, or lack thereof. He meets two "professional feminists" in Bajram Curri and gives them "no more than a 50-50 chance of getting to Tirana unviolated." It's as if he hopes something bad will befall these women. He tries to track them down in Tirana:
"...when I enquired at the various aid agencies no one had ever heard of them...All sorts of people were disappearing without trace in Albania that summer." (p. 267)
As if he really cared-or as if that were really happening. The above quotes are taken from the hard cover version published in 1998. If you plan on traveling to Albania, or merely want to learn more about this strange and beautiful country, don't waste your money on this book. James Pettifer's "Blue Guide" is so much more useful. Edith Durham's "High Albania" and Lloyd Jones' "Biografi" are more informative about the Albanian people.
Rating: 
Summary: This is a good starting point!
Review: This book is well worth reading. If only to learn how NOT to judge other human beings! Nevertheless it is well written, quiet funny at times, very inaccurate much of the time, but manages to give an idea of the nobility, the dignity, the kindness and generosity of an extremely poor nation. I lived and worked in Albania for seven months.
Rating:
Summary: Well worth reading for an up-to-date review on Albania
Review: This book is well written and a pleasure to read. I picked it up upon my return from a three-week trip to Greece, including the fascinating Epirus and Macedonia. As at some points on my trip I was a mere 30 kilometers from the Albanian border, it appeared as a logical follow-up to benefit from Carver's lively and recent experience. The good maps help a great deal. I feel that after reading the book I have gained a good understanding of what makes Albania tick (or not tick!). Although the beginning is slow, the momentum builds up; it is well worth to hang on!
Rating:
Summary: Good travel reading!
Review: What a great book to read while on a plane, a bus, or train. This book contained many familiar references and pictures, as I'd traveled through Albania the same year as the author. Had I known what he experienced, I'd probably have reconsidered my trip! While I had no problems, Carver's travelogue takes the reader through incredible experiences with a variety of people that illustrate the Albanian mind, so unique these days, having been isolated for 50 years under a repressive dictator. The amazing thing is that it's non-fiction. This is a fascinating country, and this book takes you on a clearly on-tourist look at the people, landscape, and culture.
Rating:
Summary: A "can't-put-it-down" travelog
Review: When I started reading the book, I had decided I hated it after the first chapter because of the authors blatant stereo-typical and blanketed statements about the nature of the Albanian people. But, for some reason, I stuck with the book. By the 3rd chapter, I was hooked, taking it with me everywhere to catch snippets of his adventure. My mind was in Albania. The authors willingness to take insane risks to view a remote, primative and frighteningly violent part of white-mans Europe makes this a fantastic adventure story. As you get to know the odd assortment of characters along the way, and suffer with the author through numerous iritating and crazy-making incidents, you come away with a crystal-clear picture of another place, another people, stuck in another time. My only critisism (if you can call it that) is that as an entranced reader, i craved MORE PICTURES. BIGGER PICTURES. COLOR PICTURES. Maybe a movie would do? From one Balkan adventurer to another, a big thanks to the author for having the courage (or temporary insanity?) To not listen to his mother, his friends, and the rest of the world in order to get the story, before this magical, crazy world fell off into the abyss of institutionalized maddness for another 40 years....
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