Synopsis
In 1925, legendary explorer Percy Fawcett ventured into uncharted realms of the Amazon jungle in order to discover "The Lost City of Z," an ancient civilization that he believed could have been the basis for the mythical El Dorado. Fawcett and his party disappeared, never to be heard from again. Eighty years later, David Grann, an ordinary reporter for The New Yorker, uncovered Fawcett's diaries and found himself compelled to follow in the footsteps of the intrepid adventurer. While this may sound like the premise of an old serial novel or the next Indiana Jones sequel, all of these events are true, as told in Grann's confessional chronicle, which documents his swelling obsession to conquer the Amazon wilderness and solve this centuries-old mystery. Once in the jungle, he encounters the expected antagonistic natives and hostile beasts of prey, but what he uncovers about Fawcett and his mystical "City of Z" makes for an amazing conclusion to his quest. Selected by Publishers Weekly as one of the Top 10 Books of 2009 and by the New York Times Book Review as a Notable Book of 2009.
| Key Details | | Author: | David Grann | | Language: | English | | Format: | Audio | | ISBN-10: | 0739376985 | | ISBN-13: | 9780739376980 |
| Additional Details | | Narrated by: | Mark Deakins | | Edition Description: | Unabridged |
| Size | | Thickness: | 1.2 in | | Weight: | 8.8 oz |
Publisher's Note
A grand mystery reaching back centuries. A sensational disappearance that made headlines around the world. A quest for truth that leads to death, madness or disappearance for those who seek to solve it. The Lost City of Z is a blockbuster adventure narrative about what lies beneath the impenetrable jungle canopy of the Amazon. After stumbling upon a hidden trove of diaries, acclaimed New Yorker writer David Grann set out to solve "the greatest exploration mystery of the twentieth century": What happened to the British explorer Percy Fawcett and his quest for the Lost City of Z? In 1925 Fawcett ventured into the Amazon to find an ancient civilization, hoping to make one of the most important discoveries in history. For centuries Europeans believed the world’s largest jungle concealed the glittering kingdom of El Dorado. Thousands had died looking for it, leaving many scientists convinced that the Amazon was truly inimical to humankind. But Fawcett, whose daring expeditions helped inspire Conan Doyle’s The Lost World, had spent years building his scientific case. Captivating the imagination of millions around the globe, Fawcett embarked with his twenty-one-year-old son, determined to prove that this ancient civilization—which he dubbed “Z”—existed. Then he and his expedition vanished. Fawcett’s fate—and the tantalizing clues he left behind about “Z”—became an obsession for hundreds who followed him into the uncharted wilderness. For decades scientists and adventurers have searched for evidence of Fawcett’s party and the lost City of Z. Countless have perished, been captured by tribes, or gone mad. As David Grann delved ever deeper into the mystery surrounding Fawcett’s quest, and the greater mystery of what lies within the Amazon, he found himself, like the generations who preceded him, being irresistibly drawn into the jungle’s “green hell.” His quest for the truth and his stunning discoveries about Fawcett’s fate and “Z” form the heart of this complex, enthralling narrative.
Interweaves the story of British explorer Percy Fawcett, who vanished during a 1925 expedition into the Amazon to find an ancient civilization, with the author's own adventure-filled quest into the uncharted wilderness to uncover the mysteries surrounding Fawcett's final journey and the secrets of what really lies deep in the Amazon jungle. Simultaneous.
Interweaves the story of British explorer Percy Fawcett, who vanished during a 1925 expedition into the Amazon, with the author's own quest to uncover the mysteries surrounding Fawcett's final journey and the secrets of what lies deep in the Amazon jungle.
Industry Reviews
"The reader is taken just as close to Grann as the author is to Fawcett - tantalizingly close but never touching. His findings give us as complete a picture of the city of Z as we're likely to get, even if Fawcett forever remains brilliantly and maddeningly nowhere to be seen."
(02/22/2009)
"Grann has an extraordinary sense of pacing, and his scenes of forest adventure are dispatched in passages of swift, arresting simplicity."
(02/01/2009)
"THE LOST CITY OF Z is at once a biography, a detective story and a wonderfully vivid piece of travel writing....[It] reads with all the pace and excitement of a movie thriller and all the verisimilitude and detail of firsthand reportage, and it seems almost surely destined for a secure perch on the best-seller lists."
(03/16/2009)
"As writer David Grann makes abundantly clear in this fascinating, epic story of exploration and obsession, the lethal attraction of the Amazon mystery remains strong...[He] brilliantly re-creates Fawcett's perilous Amazon expeditions, especially what is known of his ill-fated 1925 journey."
(03/11/2009)
"THE LOST CITY OF Z...recounts Fawcett's expeditions with all the pace of a white-knuckle adventure story. The book is a model of suspense and concision....Although [the] story cuts through 100 years of complicated history, Grann follows its twists and turns admirably. Thoroughly researched, vividly told, this is a thrill ride from start to finish."
(03/08/2009)
"[THE LOST CITY OF Z] is a powerful narrative, stiff lipped and Victorian at the edges, as if one of those stern men of Conrad had found himself trapped in a novel by Garcia Marquez."
(03/01/2009)
"What makes Mr. Grann's telling of the story so captivating is that he decides not simply to go off in search of yet more relics of our absent hero -- but to go off himself in search of the city that Fawcett was looking for so heroically when he suddenly went AWOL."
(02/27/2009)
"...Grann provides an in-depth, captivating character study that has the relentless energy of a classic adventure tale."
(10/13/2008)
|
Back to search results
) 
All rights reserved.
