Who hasn't dreamed of escaping all of the trappings of today's modern life and finding a secluded, spiritually immersive oasis to reinvigorate the soul? Yet dreaming and doing are worlds apart. Not so for Bruce Kirkby, wife Christine, and sons Bodi and Taj. In Kirkby's travel memoir Blue Sky Kingdom, the family traverses the Himalayas by foot and horseback to arrive at an ethereal monastery hanging off of the edge of a mountain in Zanskar, a remote region of India. The impetus for the trip is a combination of Kirkby's increasing preoccupation with technology and Bodi's diagnosis of what is at the time termed Asperger's syndrome (now categorized under autism spectrum disorder). As the author scrolls through his phone over Cheerios, he realizes Bodi has described the entire solar system, yet he heard not a word until his son began screaming for his attention. Kirkby waxes philosophical ...