James Meek is a novelist. He is well known for three other novels but is better known as a journalist writing about the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan and the crisis of the detention centre of Guantanamo Bay. His last book was the critically acclaimed ‘People’s act of love.’

‘We are now beginning our descent’ is familiar territory for Meek for it does describe some of the political machinations at work in Afghanistan. Some wise lines inform the book and the place of neutrality in war as espoused by the central character Adam Kellas: ‘There’s two ways to be a neutral in a war. One is not to know about it, and the other is not to care.’

Adam Kellas is hired by his newspaper to cover the troubled events in Afghanistan post 9/11. All the world seemed to talk of nothing more than the Taliban and their own harsh war against the Northern Alliance. But Kellas is intoxicated by love, in this unknown wilderness, for another journalist called Astrid. This too is a central concern of the novel. Kellas has an old school friend called McGurgan who lives in Scotland with his wife Sophie (an old flame of Kellas) and children. McGurgan is a successful novelist. McGurgan is a wilder character embroiled in simmering domestic turmoil. Kellas cannot make sense of this and he goes to the US to find out if his novel is going to be successful and to link up with Astrid who now lives in America. Part of Kellas’ problem is his inability to read communications and other people’s feelings properly. He is a skilful war correspondent but the rest of his life is deeply unsatisfying. The title of the book is descriptive of his condition as well as airline speak for continuous travel and arriving at the destination. That is what Kellas is doing constantly.

Passages of Meek’s novel are extremely visceral and descriptive of a war correspondent’s life. One feels that it gets close to the bone of the real war zone and its panoply of weaponry, unpredictable attacks and unusually tense, quiet periods. The character of Mohammed the interpreter rings true honestly in the carnage. But sometimes Kellas feels more like a combatant than a correspondent. The pursuit of Astrid to America heaps disappointment upon disappointment and this marks out his lack of self awareness. The American characters are sketched in quickly, but perceptively. Both his publisher’s agent and bus driver Lloyd are resentful of him for his attacks upon America in print. His friend’s wife Sophie berates him for his lack of boldness. We end with Kellas reunited with Astrid at another psychological impasse. Meek proposes that Kellas is unable to change and must always suffer. He cannot hold his friends. I read the book in fits and starts and grew frustrated at Kellas’ impetuosity and moral weakness. Meek has written a book about the disappointment that love brings to the lovers and the Hamlet like inability to make important decisions in any meaningful way.