2 comments about Vanished!: Explorers Forever Lost.

1. VANISHED! EXPLORERS FOREVER LOST by Evan Balkan is good. Really, REALLY good. Suspenseful, concise portraits of 9 adventurers, some famous and others more obscure, include:
   
   Amelia Earhart
   Antoine de Saint-Exupery
   Ambrose Bierce
   Glen & Bessie Hyde
   Percy Fawcett
   Everett Ruess
   Michael Rockefeller
   Johnny Waterman
   
   It is easy to either lionize or denigrate out-sized personalities, but Balkan is clear-eyed and compassionate. Adventurers are placed into context: how the person fit into their own era, and the impact of their disappearance on society and their families. A book revolving around tragedy might easily be dark and depressing. VANISHED! is not: Balkan leavens the subject matter with a wry turn of phrase at just the right time. He also discusses the meaning of adventure and risk, and its importance to even the most sedentary "armchair explorer".
   
   Exhaustive research seems to have gone into this book. As a climber of 20+ years and an extensive collector of mountaineering literature, I have long been familiar with Johnny Waterman's sad saga. Balkan delineated Waterman's familial background concisely, setting into context Johnny's epic climb of Mt. Hunter in a way the non-climber could understand and appreciate. Yet, VANISHED! included details new to me. Kudos to Balkan's well-done homework, utilizing essential citations such as Glenn Randall's little-known book, Breaking Point: Challenge on Alaska's Mt. Hunter, THE AMERICAN ALPINE JOURNAL, and personal communications.
   
   My only "complaint" is that VANISHED! was too short. The book is a good value, but Balkan is a gifted author and I would have enjoyed reading more. One is hoping that his next book will have "covers that are a long way apart."
   
   



2. This short but diverting read tells the stories of 8 different disappearances while exploring. The prose is somewhat inelegant and relies on colloquial expressions and the author's imaginings of possible events as much as on plain facts and scholarly vocabulary. The book's subjects -- Ambrose Bierce, Percy Fawcett, Glen & Bessie Hyde, Everett Ruess, Amelia Earhart, Antoine de Saint-Exupery, Michael Rockefeller, and Johnny Waterman -- make for engaging reading. It's just a shame that it's all over so soon. Perhaps Balkan didn't feel it necessary to go too much in-depth about the circumstances of the disappearances and the details of their lives before their final journeys, but in that case I wish he had produced a lengthier tome by including some of the other missing explorers of the 19th and 20th centuries. All in all, it's a surface-deep read, but the author clearly did a fair bit of research and it will certainly be entertaining for those unfamiliar with these ill-fated individuals.

5 comments about Porter Rockwell Biography.

1. I have read this book before and wanted a copy of my own for my library. It is a very interesting book about a very interesting man who led a strange life. Having lived in Utah most of my life I wanted to know about the history of the people who lived here before me. The Mormons here like to make him out to be a hero of sorts but I think that he was not all that they say.



2. I agree with critics of this book, i.e., willy-nilly insertions of the Rockwell character into scenarios that are all action-based and nothing of history--if, indeed, Rockwell was a participant. There is nothing of history here--just accounts, no basis, and certainly nothing theoretical. There is nothing from the author. "Porter Rockwell" is a study of omission. There is no mention of the Mountain Meadows massacre of 1857. Early in the book, as other reviewers have noted, Rockwell is magically plopped into actions the author assumed happened. I think Mr. Dewey must be a Mormon, the mention of which is not meant critically, but an admitted Mormon affiliation would surely have meant buyer hesitance. As 1857 was bypassed, I stopped reading the book. Lastly, the book jacket lauds Mr. Dewey's "years of historical research," all climaxed by a CLIO award--which is not in any way relevant to history. The book is interesting, but is a compilation, not history. It provided the basis of a film that, coincidentally, included the author's participation.



3. I can't put this book down! Dewey does an excellent job of placing the reader back in time as he develops the amazing story that is the coming about and triumph over the persecutions of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Because there is little written about Rockwell, Dewey does a traffic job of taking the reader through the church's history through church archives and journals describing how Rockwell was present at many important events loved by members of the church. I give it 4 stars and say it is a must read for those who are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and for those who would like to know more.



4. This book is a poor, almost fictional attempt to chronicle the life of the infamous Orrin Porter Rockwell. While I'm sure Dewey's intentions were good, he did a bad job of presenting History.
   His subject was a difficult one, Rockwell having left no diary. In addition, there are a few undetailed accounts of him in the official History of the Church to which he belonged. Most of the rest is speculation. Despite this lack of evidence, Dewey assumes that he knows Porter's mind and emotions on all occasions. How could he know that something "turned Porter's stomach" or "hit close to home" if Rockwell never left a journal?
   Most of his biography is speculation. The bulk of the work is actually a brief overview of the history of the Mormon church, and Dewey just inserts Rockwell wherever he wants to. For example, he tells the story of a group of Mormons who, in 1838, went out to defend their Missouri homes. Dewey just assumes Porter was there, and says he was "probably riding at their head."
   Toward the end of Rockwell's life, firsthand accounts of him become few and far between. In order to deal with this, Dewey simply lumps together all accounts and legends of Rockwell with no consistency or continuity whatsoever. The stories jump around, and each paragraph is an entirely new subject. This is very difficult to read, and does little besides give a collection of myths.
   This book gets two stars because of Dewey's obvious sincerity. He is not a historian by trade, and it shows. His subject is a difficult one to write about, and Dewey managed to chronicle his life with some accuracy (despite all the speculation). If you want to read an interesting tale/legend about one of the most heroic Western lawmen, read this book. Just don't expect much in the way of historical accuracy.



5. Dewey does a defensive history of Rockwell, and does a good job of dispelling many of the myths. But like so many writers embracing LDS apologetics, he seems to be a frustrated lawyer, having an image of himself as Rockwell's latter-day defense council. He is too careful not to impugn the reputations of early church leaders, especially Joseph Smith.

   To understand just what faith-promoting history is, we should look at what Elder Boyd K Packer says about it:

   "That historian or scholar who delights in pointing out the weaknesses and frailties of present or past leaders destroys faith.... In the Church we are not neutral. We are one-sided."

   So we can see that a "one-sided" history is not comprehensive by any means.

   Dewey is definitely from the faith-promoting school of history, and writes as if "the Brethern" are looking over his shoulder. Because of this he has omitted significant discomfiture found in other Rockwell biographies. This less "faith-promoting" information would have been included if Dewey had adhered to principles followed by professional historians. However, because he did not, we are deprived of aspects more rounded but unfortunately more embarrassing to the LDS Church.

No comments about Three Women of Herat: A Memoir of Life, Love and Friendship in Afghanistan.

5 comments about Kabloona.

1. I read this book and thought, yes this Frenchman makes many derogatory and embarassingly insensitive remarks about the Inuit. However, contrary to what one reviewer said below in "Good descriptions, bad insights, July 27, 2005", the author slowly develops a great respect for the intelligence, culture and abilities of these people so much so that he begins to emulate them. It is a subtle conversion story wrapped in a fabulous adventure; thoroughly enjoyable and well worth reading.



2. The audio CD is outstanding...indeed the best I have ever listened to. For one thing, the narrator is marvelous in recreating both the 1930's world of France and Frozen Canada. I can't think of any other book or audio that so successfully transported me into an alien culture. Considering that there are quite a few films and books about Eskimos, why buy this one written 70 years ago? Answer: the literary quality of this work surpasses the prose of the last quarter century. When you listen to the narrator weave his tale, it mirrors the experience of hearing a tobacco chewing explorer slowly recounting his adventures in the wild. The story dives deep into the interior life of the author as much as it details an ethnographic examination of (primitive) Inuit life. The myths and values of the Eskimos contrast sharply with the borgeouis morals of a gentleman of Paris. For example, in Eskimo culture, there is little concept of private property...that's why an Eskimo man will let you borrow his wife or a snow knife. Language in the arctic is far more concrete. A polar bear is HE WHO HAS NO SHADOW. Far away, in the cold Arctic, author Grontran De Poncins learns what it means to be human, a man preeminently. This is a romance, a classic reminiscent of Robinson Crusoe. If you buy the audio CD, you will not be disappointed.



3. This is a magical book which I first read when I was young. It inspired in me dreams of adventure which I did not follow, but which became a part of my inner life. Now that I am old, I am reading Kabloona again so that I can remember that I once was young.



4. My good friend and I were talking a while back after I had watched the movie The Fast Runner, which he had recommended. Talk got around to my deciding to send him my old childhood copy (out of print, I believe) of Peter Freuchen's Book of the Eskimos, and his deciding to send me his old childhood copy of Kabloona. Neither of us had ever heard of the other's book. I must say, as much as I've always liked Freuchen, I got the better of the deal!
   
   What a wonderful book. So well written, such nice storytelling, so enjoyable, refreshingly honest, and unexpectedly insightful. It is haunting. It really is in a class by itself, although I have trouble putting my finger on exactly why this is so. All I know is that I did not want it to end, as I'm sure the author did not want his time in the North to end. And, like him, I don't think it will be the same if I go back and try it again. And I know I also had a strange feeling throughout which only later I identified as a form of envy, envy for the experiences this man had and for his ability to experience them so deeply. I've seldom felt envy mixed with awe and admiration like this before.
   
   Of all the book, I was most deeply moved by his account of the priest out in the middle of nowhere who had survived and kept warm in incredible cold merely through the power of faith and prayer. Humbling.
   
   A man comes out of nowhere, lives these experiences, writes this incredible book, and disappears back into nowhere. Amazing. Read it.



5. I looked up at the bookshelf over my computer and spotted the battered 1941 edition of Kabloona that has been in my family for 40 years since I first read it in the village of Coppermine (now Kugluktuk) when I was a 12 year old boy in 1961. I decided to do an AMAZON.com search to see if anyone else knew of this marvel that had so enchanted me as a child, and found the site you are now visiting.
   
   We were much more civilized in the Coppermine of 1961 than the same village the author had visited 20 years earlier. We had electricity, and communication with the outside world by a Morse code key at the Department of Transport office, plus we had a scheduled visit by a single-engine Otter every two weeks. It was a magical time for me (adults found it a difficult time, but they simply did not understand things)
   
   The book Kabloona gave me insight into the minds of the people around me. We were a community of 200 Inuit (Eskimos) and 35 whites. The whites had as many of the amenities of civilization as they could garner, but the Inuit lived much as described in De Poncin's book.
   
   I was enthralled by the awesome hunters with their dog sleds and their magnificent huskies, not show dogs or racing dogs, but working dogs that made the difference between life and death. The men would bring back the carcasses of seal and caribou, and the furs they had trapped. The women sewed the furs into beautiful garments that kept man, woman and child warm in intolerably hard winters. It was also the women's job to butcher the carcasses, which they did with incredible speed and skill using only the ulu, or woman's knife. I regularly witnessed the activities of this way of life. De Poncin described all this in his book, but he also gave me insight into the underlying culture I was immersed in.
   
   You can't live the life I led 40 years ago as a boy in the high Canadian arctic, but you can vicariously journey there to an even more primitive time, and enter into the incredible peace and stillness of an arctic winter night in an igloo, or the warmth and safety of a house made of snow as an unbelievable storm rages outside around you.
   
   I recently spoke by satellite telephone to a man in Coppermine from my home in Missouri where I now live, and found that the village I once knew is now a very different place. But you can go back to an earlier era with De Poncin. I assure you, you won't regret your wonderful voyage with him.
   
   I don't know if I'm permitted to speak of it here, but I have described my life in those years in the Arctic in a book, The Boy Who Fell To Earth. It is available at Amazon.com for those would like to buy a hard copy, or can be read for free on my warmbooks.com web site.

5 comments about Winds of Havoc, The : A Memoir of Adventure and Destruction in Deepest Africa.

1. When I started reading The Winds of Havoc,I had the impression the book would be the memories of a gone by lifestyle, and quite frankly I was repulsed by how important the big game hunting business seemed like. Not until I reached the last quarter of the book did I realize the value of the author's memories in providiing a picture of a productive and peaceful "colonial" lifestyle and comparing it to the present state of Mozambique's existence. Clearly, African politics have changed for the worst over the last half of the 20th century. For all that was wrong about colonialism, the "indiginization" of most African countries has been a failure that will hurt Africa and the rest of the world for most of the 21st century. The fate of the African wildlife is an accurate indicator of the evolution of Mozambiquean politics. Mozambique will go as the wildlife goes.



2. If there is a single book that informs and clarifies issues pertaining to Africa, from European colonization to the new millennium, this is the one. I am a seasoned collector of books on Africa. Nothing on my shelves, however, can compare with The Winds of Havoc. Adelino SERRAS PIRES and Fiona CAPSTICK have an intimate knowledge of Africa and I personally know many of the people mentioned in this book. I also had the honor of working with Adelino in Africa in the 1980s. This book confirms the courage and honesty he has retained throughout his turbulent life, qualities he never abandoned when many other people would have been tempted to give in to their tormentors. There are shocking revelations in this book as the reader is taken on a unique odyssey into many African countries, witnessing the fate of the wildlife as the winds of change became gales of violence which spared nothing and nobody. The book is an education. Adelino's extraordinary life and Fiona Capstick's ability with words make this book a compelling, disturbing experience. Buy it before the first printing sells out!



3. I am black and I am angry. I live in Africa, The Winds of Havoc has been a revelation because finally, the lies that went with the turf of our liberation are beginning to be exposed. This book is a good start, I salute you Adelino Serras Pires



4. The Winds of Havoc is much more than an adventure or hunting novel. I want to congratulate the authors Fiona and Adelino on a very special, genuine and valuable contribution to the modern history of Mozambique, and also of post-colonial Africa generally. From my experience as a scholar of contemporary Mozambican affairs, as an active participant in the Mozambique peace process 1989-1995, and as Special Advisor to the then Special Representative of the Secretary General of the UN, Mr Aldo Ajello, I can recommend this book as essential reading. But most of all, it reads easily and really well. It takes you on a journey of adventure and passion and tragedy, and I found it impossible to put it down before I had come to the last page.



5. Fiona and Adelina have hit a bases loaded home run! Adelino, I am so sorry that humanity can treat others so badly. Your days incarcerated, cold, hungry and with your hands and feet hurting so bad, brought tears to my eyes. What a horrible injustice.

   If you do not know anything about East African history, particularly Mozambique, this book will show the "Havoc" that occured at this time in Africa between two factions.

   This is a book makes you get a map out to see where these stories take place. You find that you want to read over at least once again.

   Art Gonzalez

3 comments about True North.

1. I read some of the previous reviews before getting this and some were positive and some negative...I have to say I was very much pleased with the book, excellent story and tale with local dialogue to add an element of adventure and flair. I just really enjoyed the story and to see the hardships people faced...



2. This book will transcend you to a time and place that makes you feel at peace with nature. Merrick's writing is like poetry in motion. You will wish you could have been there to experience the times when he is at one with the universe. The people and places he is writing about no longer exist, which is the greatest pity of all.



3. A fascinating book! A well written account by a man who traveled extensively in the Canadian North in the 1930s, just as the traditional remoteness that had characterized that world was ending with the introduction of planes and other technologies. Merrick was a keen and sympathetic friend of the North, its history and its Native peoples.

5 comments about Close to the Wind: An Extraordinary Story of Triumph Over Adversity.

1. Pete Goss was born to be close to the wind. Although Goss admits in this autobiography that he had rather weak goals growing up, it is clear that Goss is one of those persons born to be before the mast. Even his nine year stint in the Royal Marines was that of a compleat sailor as his military career focused on representing his Service in a series of transatlantic and other competitions. It all seems too serendipitous, at least until the reader realizes that Goss's life is one where his ambition and his circumstances happily coincide in an almost preordained fashion.
   
   Perhaps that is why Goss's constant (realistic) financial concerns and searches for sponsorship grate so badly upon the reader. His money worries are a consistent theme in CLOSE TO THE WIND. And it is true that had Goss not pressed himself to continually move forward he probably would have been broke and unable to pursue his dreams. To me, Goss is not the bigger hero in this book, but rather his wife Tracey, who never seemed to flag in her devotion either to Pete or to his dreams.
   
   The ultimate dream was to compete in the 1996-97 Vendee Globe, a single-handed circumnavigation across the Southern Ocean. For the Vendee, Pete Goss commissioned the building of "Aqua Quorum" a revolutionary high-speed sailboat with a pendulum keel. "Aqua Quorum" performed magnificently.
   
   And so did Goss. A thousand miles from land in a Christmas Day Austral Summer hurricane under polar conditions, Goss received word that a race competitor, Raphael Dinelli, was aboard his sinking boat and facing certain death. Goss immediately turned "Aqua Quorum" back into the teeth of the storm, sailed nearly 200 miles back on his track, and plucked the hypothermic Dinelli from the sea.
   
   Although Goss came in only fifth (in a field of six finishers) he was awarded the French Legion of Honor and an MBE by Queen Elizabeth for his rescue of Dinelli. CLOSE TO THE WIND is a tale of true heroism told in an honest, unassuming, but never diffident tone by a man who merely did what he felt he had to. And, more important than any accolades, is Goss's pleasure at making a new friend.



2. There seems to be an odd hero worship associated with this author and his book about adventure and glory seeking. I found Goss's feats to be impressive but the account disturbing. I finished the book wishing I hadn't read it. He comes across as quite impressed with himself and has little of the modesty and understatement that I have found more typical of good adventure writing. (Compare Bernard Moitessier's books about equally difficult sailing accomplishments.) If you are looking for a philosopher/adventurer, Goss is not it. His reliance on expletives in key passages gives the account a vulgar quality. Like many others I was mystified as to why so much ink was spent on the fund raising effort. There probably was a good story there but I don't think he told it. Clearly Pete Goss is an awesome sailor, but this book portrays him more as attention seeker and even his website still boasts about the rescue. If you haven't read sailing books before read Moitessier or Smeeton instead.



3. This book is basically a life story, with no details spared of the races leading up to the vendee, the innumerable business ventures. If you're a novice sailor and want to read this book to learn about racing and bluewater sailing and whatnot, you may find yourself learning more about fundraising, instead.
   
   Granted, it is a decent book, it was a quick and light read, and it really really motivates one to get up and do stuff. While he spends a great deal of time talking about his effort to raise the cash, his tenacity is impressive and inspiring.



4. One of the great books of mankind's love for his brother. The strength of that love and the power of that love proven in the ice cold seas of the roaring forties. The saved and the saviour both watched over by an angel named Tracey whose love and faith in her husband, Pete, made it all possible for the heroic rescue of Raphael Dinelli.



5. A great story of adventure, as the author describes his voyages around the world in several premier yacht races. Of course, the author did not chose a literary profession as a career, but never the less, he does a good job of describing in exciting detail the struggles and achievements of his life long obsession with some of the most challenging sailing events in the world.

No comments about Dark Safari: The Life Behind the Legend of Henry Morton Stanley.

1 comments about Kidnapped in the Amazon Jungle.

1. I read this book over a decade ago. I just can't believe no one has reviewed it. I just remember that it was really good. I'll try my best review it. It takes place in the Peruvian Amazon region during the rubber boom. Manuel is a young teen living in a dull town and anxious to join his uncle in the rubber tapping business. He goes against his mother's wishes. When sailing down the Amazon they are attacked by hostile Indians who resent the encroachment. Manuel is captured and very slowly integrated into the tribe. He assimilates their customs, including using hallucinogenic drugs for visions. He is eventually bestowed the honor of becoming the apprentice to the shaman, healer.
   
   I also highly recommend The Serpent and the Rainbow by Wade Davis. It deals with a similar subject.

1 comments about John Smith's Chesapeake Voyages, 1607-1609.

1. John Smith's Chesapeake Voyages 1607-1609 is a scholarly, extensive, and detailed examination of Captain John Smith's historic voyages exploring the Chesapeake Bay and its tributary rivers. Smith himself documented his travels with care; the famous event when he was captured and brought before the great chief Powhatan was only one highlight of a vast and intrepid adventure. John Smith's Chesapeake Voyages 1607-1609 reconstructs Smith's travels day by day, discussing the Native American reaction to British territorial encroachment as well as Smith's viewpoint, and meticulously calculates the winds, tides, and local currents Smith would have faced on his journey. Illustrated with a scattering of black-and-white as well as color maps and vintage artworks, John Smith's Chesapeake Voyages 1607-1609 is a seminal contribution to American history shelves in general and Chesapeake Bay history shelves in particular. Highly recommended, especially for public and college library collections.