Book Summary

The Boston Sunday Global says of Mountains beyond mountains “a true-to-life fairy tale, one that inspires you to believe in happy endings…its stark sense of reality comes as much from the grit between the pages as from the pure gold those pages spin.”

Book Review

This book is as much about a story of a man who was driven to cure the world as it is about the author and his journey in discovering the foot prints left by Dr. Paul Farmer.

Dr. Farmer’s childhood seems to have been pre-destined to prepare him for the commitment and passion that drives him as as adult. He becomes committed to the people of Haiti to be their doctor, their friend and their protector. I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in learning about this very generous man. The following excerpts are ones that left an impression on me.

• A 13 year old girl with meningitis is in need of care. Dr. Farmer performs a spinal tap on the little girl. Wild cries erupt from the child: “Li fe-m mal, mwen grangou!” Farmer interprets her cries. She’s crying: “It hurts, I’m hungry.” He says, Can you believe it? Only in Haiti would a child cry out that she’s hungry during a spinal tap.
• The title Mountains by Mountains is inspired by a proverb that means opportunities are inexhaustible or When you surmount one great obstacle you merely gain a clear view of the next one.
• As Farmer walked around Cange, he noticed people wearing well worned brand-name running shoes and baseball caps and T-shirts bearing the logos of professional sports teams and country clubs. Kennedys is what these are called. President Kennedy sponsored a program that sent machine oil, among other things, to Haiti. The Haitians tried to use the oil for other purposes, such as cooking, and concluded that the gift was of inferior quality. Ever since, the president’s name had been synonymous here with secondhand and shoddy goods.
• Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good.
• As Farmer travels the world many times he calls his mother in Florida, to ask her to give him a wake-up call at 7:00 a.m. where ever he may be, even though there is an alarm clock available. Kidder counted time zones and figured Farmer’s mother would have to be up at 1:00 a.m. to make the call. He wondered if she minded, but she told Kidder months later, I just think it’s so cool that at forty he still does that. I’d miss it if he didn’t. There is am important lesson here.
• Kidder wondered if there was room in Farmers philosophy for anyone but the world’s poor and people who campaigned on behalf of the poor. One day on an airplane, he confided to Kidder that he thought of all his fellow passengers as patients. When ever the attendants voice has said ” Is there a doctor onboard?” He would get up at once and minister to the person in need. Farmer had told him this happened about once in every eighteen flights. Kidder had the impression that Farmer wouldn’t have minded if it happened on every flight.