The Sheltering Sky is the story of three Americans - Port and Kit, a married couple, and their friend Tunner - traveling through post-World War Two Algeria. They mingle with a wide cast of characters - hoteliers, shopkeeps, prostitutes, a strange British couple, a handful of French Legionnaires, and so on - as they descend into a kind of feverish darkness.

The book jacket on my copy said something about how this book explores the destruction of foreign cultures by Americans who lack understanding of those cultures. Not a bad theme to explore, but this book didn’t seem to explore it. If anything the reverse was true - it seemed to me that none of the Americans came out very much better at the end of this story, whereas the Algerians seemed to hang on just fine. This book seems to be trying to make a geopolitical point of some kind or another - even the punctuation is dripping with post-colonial politics - but the point seems to me rather lost, or muddled at best.

The story reminded me here and there of The Quiet American and Heart of Dearkness - stealing a post-War French colonial setting from the first and a theme of descent into madness from the second. While the writing was mostly quite gripping in its own way, I don’t think it measured up to either of those classics particularly well. The last third or so of the book seemed to be just one long string of fever dreams, which was really dreadful to get through; nor did it seem to add all that much to the story.

I found the characters mostly forgettable - except for the oddly thick but quiet marital discontent between Port and Kit. On the other hand I quite enjoyed the setting and found it really fascinating: the post-War Sahara is the kind of thing that you just don’t encounter very often, even if you do read Camus.

I’m a little conflicted as to a recommendation. It’s certainly an interesting read for quite a long stretch, but it certainly does fall off toward the end!