Journalist and author David Lamb, who "enjoyed the nomadic life, absorbed what he witnessed, made 'friends not sources,' as one editor put it, and wrote masterfully--even poetically--about people and events in the Middle East, Africa and Southeast Asia," died June 5, the Los Angeles Times reported. He was 76.
Lamb's books include The Arabs; The Africans; Vietnam, Now: A Reporter Returns; Stolen Season: A Journey Through America & Baseball's Minor Leagues; and Over the Hills: A Midlife Escape Across America by Bicycle.
"You could send him to a country in turmoil and get great copy," recalled his former boss Alvin Shuster, foreign editor of the L.A. Times from 1983 to 1995. "And then you could send him to Australia, where nothing was happening, and get great copy."
And Peter Osnos, founder and editor-at-large of PublicAffairs, called Lamb "a splendid author of multiple books."