A first-person account of travels among the Torgut Mongols by the Swedish explorer who accompanied Sven Hedin on his exploration of Mongolia and Central Asia in the 1920s and 1930s. Full of colorful incident of shamans, bandits and brigands, the book takes us to the lost city of Karatoka in the Gobi Desert and gives us a front row seat at the birth of a new nation.  (MGL16, $15.95)