Book Review: The Meadow by Adrian Levy, Cathy Scott-Clark

I chanced upon Levy and Scott-Clarke's book 'The Siege' - a fantastic non-fiction thriller about the 26/11 Mumbai terror invasion - which led me to explore the author duo's other works. Though 'Deception' seemed a juicier story, I was forced to pick up 'The Meadow' since 'Deception' was not available in India (Aargh!).

And boy, did the duo not disappoint again! 'The Meadow' is a fantastic fly-on-the-wall non-fiction account of the 1995 kidnapping of six foreign tourists in Kashmir. Levy and Scott-Clarke patiently take the reader through all the players of the Game - Masood Azhar (and his father), Kashmir homegrown militants (such as Sikander), the Pakistani ISI and a myriad of Indian agencies right from the state police to RAW.

The book starts off slow as it takes you through the lives of the foreigners, before it all began. Give it time, though. The authors' investigation(s) eventually reveals a bombshell you will not expect.

Some day someone (hopefully the authors of this book) will write a complete book on Azhar - he is after all more adept at protecting his hide than Osama ever was, in addition to being arguably as adept at terrorism (his fingerprints are on the India Parliament attack, 26/11, Daniel Pearl beheading, London 7/7, etc.) Till then, 'The Meadow' is 'Masood Azhar: Origins' as much as it is the story of a kidnapping gone wrong.