Ararat

the long version

A brilliant fusion of travel writing with writing about science and religious scepticism.Ararat is a breathtaking journey along the fault-line between religion and science, a pilgrimage by a non-believer that takes Frank Westerman to Mount Ararat where, as biblical tradition has it, Noah's Ark ran aground and God made his covenant with mankind.Mount Ararat is now a geographical, political and cultural crossroads, bound up with the centuries-old history of warfare between different cultures in this region. As Westerman stands at its foot it poses both a physical and a religious challenge: where is the God from my children's bible? Who or what has taken his place? Can one free oneself of a religious upbringing?He meets geologists, priests, and, on the mountain's high slopes, an expedition in search of the Ark's remains. And also a Russian astronaut who observes that 'there is something between heaven and earth about which we humans know nothing'. Ararat is a dazzling, highly personal book about science, religion and all that lies between, by one of Europe's most celebrated young writers.