Non-Fiction | Book Chatter

The Lost City of Z
By David Grann
(Vintage, Paperback, 9781400078455, January 2010, 448pp.)

The Short of It:

A well-researched treat for the armchair traveler.

The Rest of It:

In 1925, Percival Harrison Fawcett and his eldest son, disappeared on an expedition to find the lost city of “Z”, his name for an uncharted city in the dense jungles of the Amazon. The trip was well-documented by Fawcett himself, but the facts leading up to his disappearance were sketchy enough for explorers everywhere to take a stab at what actually happened. Here, David Grann, a journalist, attempts to unravel the mystery surrounding Fawcett’s disappearance while interspersing his own stories and experiences of visiting the Amazon.

Before reading this book, I had no idea who Fawcett was. So I was quite surprised at how many explorers have gone out into the Amazon looking for him, only to fail or be killed while trying. Grann, who is definitely not an explorer, but a journalist, gives us a well-researched, methodical account of Fawcett’s trip. Using Fawcett’s journals and accounts from other explorers, he pieces together that fateful trip. The only problem, and something nearly everyone in my book club noticed, is that Fawcett could have written anything he wanted. Just how accurate were those papers?

The pacing of this book was a tad slow at times and often repetitive since many of the occurrences (parasitic attacks, malaria, etc.) repeat themselves throughout the telling. Overall, I felt as if I were part of the adventure and I do believe that is what Grann intended when he wrote the book. Some of the book club members felt that it could have been edited down a bit. I felt that way as well, but by the end of the book, I understood that Grann was attacking it from all sides and addressing different viewpoints so the extra bit of detail he included, didn’t keep me from enjoying the book.

I was worried that there wouldn’t be enough to discuss but I worried for nothing. Here are some little known facts about Fawcett as noted from Wikipedia:

Arthur Conan Doyle based his Professor Challenger character partly on Fawcett, and stories of the “Lost City of Z” became the basis for his novel The Lost World.^[15]
Fawcett has been proposed as a possible inspiration for Indiana Jones, the fictional archaeologist/adventurer.^[16]^[17] A fictionalised version of Fawcett aids Jones in the novel Indiana Jones and the Seven Veils.^[18])
According to an article in Comics Scene #45, Fawcett was the inspiration of Kent Allard, an alter ego of the Shadow.^[9]
Aloysius Pendergast, a fictional FBI special agent from the novels by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, is a Fawcett’s great-great nephew.

There were rumblings of a movie in the works with Brad Pitt backing it, but that rumor seems to have petered out.

Readers who enjoy adventure will appreciate this book, as will anyone who appreciates thorough research and tales of obsession.

Note from Ti: The ‘ick” factor in this one is probably a 5 on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being extremely icky. There are maggots and open, oozing sores and casual mentions of cannibalism involving babies but these parts are not overly graphic. Just mentions.

Source: Borrowed
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Unbroken
By Laura Hillenbrand
(Random House, Hardcover, 9781400064168, November 2010, 496pp.)

The Short of It:

A remarkable, true story of survival and endurance but the execution of the story itself didn’t impress me.

The Rest of It:

On a May afternoon in 1943, an Army Air Forces bomber crashed into the Pacific Ocean and disappeared, leaving only a spray of debris and a slick of oil, gasoline, and blood. Then, on the ocean surface, a face appeared. It was that of a young lieutenant, the plane’s bombardier, who was struggling to a life raft and pulling himself aboard. So began one of the most extraordinary odysseys of the Second World War.

Louis Zamperini’s story is remarkable. Definitely not your average man. He competed in the Olympics in track and field and although he never won a medal, he defeated the odds, competing with injuries and finishing 8th in the 1936 Summer Olympics. Later, putting his Olympic career aside, he joined the Army and became a bombardier.

However, when his bomber crashes, he is forced to survive on a raft for 47 days on the open ocean. This is when I really got to know Louis and it’s also my favorite part of the story. No fresh water to drink, limited food, and the endless sun beating down upon them. Such conditions would break any man, but not Louis Zamperini.

This is truly an amazing story. However, I found that the story was bogged down by Zamperini’s childhood antics. A great deal of time was spent on his childhood and I just didn’t think it was needed. I slogged through this part of his life and it actually caused me to not like him for the first quarter of the book. Hillenbrand’s style was very matter-of-fact. This happened, and then this happened and then two years later…this happened. I was bored to tears.

It’s true that Zamperini was a challenging youth, but really, the way it was described, he just seemed like a spoiled little shit. I didn’t need to hear about that part of his life. He would have been just as wonderful come the end of the story had it not been included.

I will say this though, his time on the raft and his years as a POW more than made-up for the quibble I mentioned above. Those parts were riveting and at times, heartbreaking. I felt that Hillenbrand took great care with the telling of those events.

When I was doing some research on Zamperini, I came across his memoir, Devil at my Heels. I think I’d like it better hearing it straight from him, instead of Hillenbrand’s re-telling of what he went through.

Overall, World War II buffs will enjoy the book. It’s a page-turner and his story is amazing.

Source: Borrowed