All the Way to Heaven: An American Boyhood in the Himalayas

When Stephen Alter began writing fiction, it was hardly surprising that his stories "were full of invisible borders and erased identities." He was born in India, the son of Presbyterian missionaries, and although he relished the majestic natural beauty of his home high in the Himalayas--memorably evoked in crystalline prose--his memoir reveals a youth who never felt quite at home anywhere. (The United States during two family furloughs seemed as exotic as India.) Alter's outsider perspective provides many telling insights in his account of a remarkable boyhood.