Kumtag Desert Kumtag Desert The Kumtag Desert (, "kum-tag" meaning "sand-mountain" in a number of Turkic languages), is an arid landform in northwestern China, which was proclaimed as a national park in the year 2002. The oval Tarim Basin with its central Taklamakan Desert is bounded on the north, west and south by mountains. On the east side the Kumtag is an unbroken plain about 100 miles from north to south that runs from the Taklamakan to Gansu and Mongolia. Many modern maps do not show a Kumtag in this sense which implies that the usage may be out of date. The
In the Heart of the Country In the Heart of the Country In the Heart of the Country (1977) is an early novel by South African-born writer J. M. Coetzee. The book is one of Coetzee's more experimental novels and is narrated through 266 numbered paragraphs rather than chapters. The novel is narrated from the point of view of Magda, the white daughter of a widowed farmer in the Karoo semi-desert of the Western Cape. Much of the novel is narrated from within the claustrophobic confines of Magda's bedroom and throughout the narrative the unreliability of Magda's narration means the reader cannot be certain what is