Today Show Talks with Greg Mortenson

One of the most talked about books on the ReadingGroupGuides.com blog of late has been Greg Mortenson's Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Promote Peace...One School at a Time. This morning the Today Show talked with Mortenson --- who has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize --- about his memoir and his mission. If your group is planning to read Three Cups of Tea, or even if you have already, you might want to check out the interview for some insight into the author and the book.

Mortenson shared some intriguing anecdotes such as the personal circumstances that inspired him to climb K2, the second-highest mountain in the world --- and how that experience in turn led him to found the Central Asia Institute, an organization that builds schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. To date, the Institute has built 78 schools and runs four dozen others. Other interesting facts: Many schools have adopted Three Cups of Tea for their course curriculums, and the book is required reading for some Pentagon employees.

For the interview, Mortenson was joined by his 12-year-old daughter, Amira, who shared her perspective on what kids in America can learn from their counterparts in other regions of the world. She contributed an Afterword to Three Cups of Tea: Young Readers Edition. There is also a children's picture book, Listen to the Wind: The Story of Dr. Greg and Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and Susan L. Roth.