The Lost City of Z - David Grann

Title: The Lost City of Z
Author: David Grann
Published: 2009 Pages: 299
Genre: Non-Fiction
Rating: 4.25/5

I'm not entirely sure how I ended up getting my hands on this one-or how I let it sit on the shelf for so long, but I'm glad I finally took the time to read this one. What an exciting book/adventure/story/legend!

In the early twentieth century (1920s), Percy Fawcett led a number of expeditions into the depths of the Amazon in South America in search for the lost city of El Dorado, a city he coded as “Z.” In 1925 Fawcett, along with his son and other expedition party members, disappeared and were never heard from again. While the search for Z in many ways consumed Fawcett, his disappearance has caused such a buzz that it is estimated 100 people have also died in the search for Fawcett’s remains.

In The Lost City of Z, David Grann, a journalist and columnist, delves into the Amazon and searches for answers to the mystery surrounding Percy Fawcett’s disappearance. It is evident that Grann has done his research, not just on the life of Fawcett, but also on the numerous other expeditions into the Amazon before and after Fawcett’s disappearance. Grann must have looked at a ton of resources because the book is brimming with information, but one thing that I really appreciated was how Grann included his quotations and secondary information seamlessly. The facts and material he used never felt out of place or even superfluous—even the details about other sometimes non-related events occurring during Fawcett’s time were fascinating.

This book could not be more interesting—well, it could be, but if I explained then I’d be giving something exciting away and you want to find that out for yourself, don’t you? Even though the book is relatively short at 300 pages, there is so much crammed in—information about Fawcett and his explorations, information about the Amazon and the tribes that currently live there (what little is known), information about the flora and fauna of the Amazon and all over fascinating tidbits (lots of information about contemporaries of Fawcett including Arthur Conan Doyle whose The Lost World is loosely based on Fawcett and his search for Z). There are some aspects, especially near the end, that I would have liked to know more about, but I think the reason why Grann does not provide more information is because of the lack of information in general on said topic (my lips are sealed!).

Would you enjoy this book? Sure! I just passed it on to my mom and I hope she likes it. While it isn’t incredibly gripping, it isn’t dry either. Non-fiction sometimes gets such a bad rap for being boring—the author shoving too many facts in your face or not incorporating research material well or stilted writing—but this book is very readable. While I don’t think we will ever know just what happened to Percy Fawcett once he disappeared, Grann compiles and interprets all of his research in a way that posits a very realistic theory. Overall a very exciting book—you know those books you read and you want to tell everyone you see little tiny details? This is definitely one of those—especially when it comes to the bugs in the Amazon—my favorite being the “eye licker.” I found myself saying over and over, “Oh my gosh—listen to this!” If you’re on the fence about this one, check out David Grann’s website. Still on the fence? Did I mention a Lost City of Z movie in 2010 with....Brad Pitt??

What's the most exciting non-fiction book you've read? (The Devil in the White City by Larson is probably mine).

The Zookeeper's Wife - Diane Ackerman

Title: The Zookeeper's Wife
Author: Diane Ackerman
Date Finished: Dec 7, 2008 #69
Published: 2007 Pages: 323
Rating: 3/5

From the back cover:
"After their zoo was bombed, Polish zookeepers Jan and Antonina Zabinski managed to save over three hundred people from the Nazis by hiding refugees in the empty animal cages. With animal names for these "guests," and human names for the animals, it's no wonder that the zoo's code name because "The House Under a Crazy Star."

More than the story of how the Zabinskis saved over three hundred people, The Zookeeper's Wife is also a history of Warsaw during WWII, especially during Nazi occupation. Not only were the Jewish targeted during the occupation, but Hitler determine to rid the world of Poles--starting with Jews and Polish intellasia. Ackerman discusses the Polish Underground, which Jan Zabinski participated in extensively, and its efforts to find safe homes for thousands of people. The Zabinskis, along with many others, bravely sacrificed their comforts and safety for years to ensure that others also remained safe.

This book is our December book club read, and I had been looking forward to it for months. Unfortunately, I was a little disappointed in the book. Most times when I read an encounter of the war, I have a tough time even rating the book (and usually don't), but there were some formatting issues that I had with this book. There is a wealth of information provided, and Ackerman has certainly done extensive research in order to write this book. But the way that the material was presented was choppy and at times even incoherent. For several chapters, it seemed that every paragraph dealt with a different subject, and it was difficult for me to keep track of what was going on and even what the current subject was. Ackerman often wandered onto tangents, and the purpose of the tangents were often unclear until later. The book flowed better when Ackerman focused on actual stories, but when talking about the war/events in general the organization was difficult to follow. The writing, however, is actually very lyrical and easy to read.

I hate to be so negative about the way this book was written because the material in the book itself is fascinating and the story of the Zabinskis is an amazing one. But even their story often took second place to other story lines. The paragraph I provided from the back cover suggests that the main focus will be how the Zabinskis hid so many people in the zoo, but aside from a few anecdotal stories and daily activities within the zoo and attached villa, I learned very little about how the Zabinskis hid and helped so many people.

But, so many other people have really loved this book--so please don't make my review the deciding factor. Read theirs also: Corinne; Heather J.; Ramya; Fyrefly

His Excellency: George Washington - Joseph J. Ellis: A Review

Title: His Excellency: George Washington
Author: Joseph J. Ellis
Pages: 275
Date Finished: August 31, 2007
Rating: 2.5/5

I am so glad to be finished with this book! As you can tell by the title, this book is a biography of George Washington. I read it for the Non-Fiction Five challenge and was a little worried about not being able to finish it (not only by the end of the challenge, but EVER).

His Excellency: George Washington spans the career and personal life of Washinton as a figure in the French-Indian War to his position as Commander in Chief during the Revolutionary War to his presidency. While the information and the life of Washington are fascinating, the writing style of Ellis was difficult to swallow. There were many times when I did not understand what was going on or would have to re-read paragraphs twice. This was especially true when Ellis was discussing the wars; when he moved on to the presidency, the writing was a little more straightforward. Why was it so difficult? Not only did Ellis use a highly elated vocabulary, but his sentences were so complex that it was hard to discern what he was really trying to say. Sometimes his writing was circular--not really leading to anything at all. Bottom line: not accessible to the masses. Result: I only got/understood a fraction of the information.

Recommendation: As I said before, Washington was a very complex and fascinating individual. He is certainly not the man I pictured him being (he did not want to be president, he was quiet, relatively uneducated, disliked conflict, etc etc). But, it did take a tremendous amount of time and will-power to slog through this one. I felt like I was back in grad school, and if not for the challenge I probably would not have finished it. Again, so glad to be done!! :)

The City of Fallen Angels - John Berendt: A Review

Title: The City of Falling Angels
Author: John Berendt
Pages: 398
Date Finished: July 30, 2007
Rating: 3.75/5

Greetings from Taos, New Mexico (where I'm freezing my Texas butt off!!) But at least I've been getting some good reading done. It’s been so long since I've read Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil that I can't really compare the two, but from my memory, I didn't like this one quite as much. Berendt travels to Vencie a few days after the opera house, The Fenice, mysteriously burns down.

After talking with a number of Venetians and getting a taste for the local flavor, Berendt decides to extend his stay (apparently for several years? It is not made clear how long). The main focus of the book is the burning of the Fenice - whether causes are negligence or arson, whether the Fenice will be renovated to the state it was before the fire, whether the politics will drive a spike between the moneymakers, the moneylenders, and those who just want the Fenice to be restored to its original splendor.

But while the story of the Fenice cannot seem to fill out a full-length book, Berendt uses up the rest of the text to tell the stories of the Venetians themselves; many of these stories are colorful and often-times related back to the Fenice, but sometimes the connections are rather weak. It seems as though Berendt searches out these colorful characters, and I wonder how indicative they really are of normal Venetians (such as the characters from MGGE are of Savannah). Regardless, many of the stories are interesting. I read the first quarter to Hubby on the way up here, but he became disinterested because of the story moving here and there and everywhere. The thread about the Fenice was especially confusing perhaps because the story only came up occasionally; I much preferred the sections where Berendt discussed the Venetians themselves rather than the political events surrounding the Fenice.

Among the cast of characters - Ezra Pound and his long-time lover Olga Rudge, who has unknowingly been duped into "giving away" all of her letters to Pound to a sketchy foundation; the Curtises, one of the first American expatriate families to live in Venice who sadly have to sell off a portion of their Palace on the Grand Canal; the Rat Man of Treviso who has found a successful recipe for rat poison and many many more. I enjoyed reading all of these people's stories, and Berendt is at times an enchanting storyteller, but there just wasn’t as much cohesiveness as I would have liked. I would recommend this book to people who like history – especially social history as this book is more about character study than anything else.

Thunderstruck - Erik Larson: A Review

Title: Thunderstruck
Author: Erik Larson
Date Finished: June 24, 2007
Pages: 401
Rating: 4/5

Erik Larson has a knack of taking two moments of history and finding their intersection in time to tell his story. While not quite as compelling as The Devil in the White City, Larson in this novel is once again successful at paralleling two seemingly unrelated events.

Thunderstuck tells the story of Marconi and his quest to send wireless transmissions first from shore to ships and finally across the Atlantic. The other half of Thunderstruck tells of Dr. Crippen, the gentle-hearted man, who brutally murdered his wife. The relation of these two events (or stories) is unclear for most of the novel, and I often found myself growing impatient with how they were going to be connected, but at the end the connection becomes evident--which at once shows the horrors of the mystery murder as well as the race for communication made available by Marconi (no, that was not an attempt on my part of make the connection clear).

What I like about Larson is his ability to delve into history. I saw this more with The Devil, but he not only gives the details about the subject at hand, but he also gives other details of the times--sometimes related sometimes as a little bit of a digression. Some of the information and history he provides in his novels are fascinating. Larson also has a way of taking a piece of history and spinning it into a mystery. While I knew the outcome of the novel before beginning, there was a still an air of suspense within the writing--allowing me to keep turning the page.

On the other hand, some of the details became a little confusing, and Larson has a habit of giving a detail and saying that it will be relevant later, but the connection for me was not always made. It was too much work to flip back to see if something was a detail he had promised to reveal earlier in the book. (Does that make sense?).

Recommendation: I would recommend this to anyone who likes history and mystery. This isn't my favorite by Larson, but I will definitely pick up his next book. If you haven't read anything by Larson yet, read The Devil in the White City--whether you like non-ficiton or not!

* Picture courtesy of www.npr.org