Author: David Grann
Publisher: Vintage Books (Random House Inc.)
Year: 2005
Genre:Adult Nonfiction/Historical
Age: 18+
Audio Publisher: Penguin Random House Audio
Audio Length: 10:04:38
Audio Reader: Mark Deakins
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This was our book for June's The Book Was Better Club meeting. I wouldn't normally read a book like this but it was actually not bad. This is my short review & comparison between the book & the movie. I ended up listening to the audio & reading, I've been doing this a lot lately. I find that it helps me get through the book faster because there are times when I'm driving or cleaning that I want to read but can't, audiobooks are very helpful in these instances.
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Colonel Percy Harrison Fawcett went into the jungle for his final adventure in January of 1925 with his oldest son Jack & his young friend Raleigh, they were in search of a lost city that Fawcett had dubbed with the name of Z. Fawcett had been searching for Z for the better half of his life & he had seen more of the Amazon jungle than anyone alive at that time. Unfortunately the trio disappeared into the jungle & were never seen or heard from again.
Getting to this point in the story was a long journey. Fawcett had been surveying maps for the Royal Geographical Society since the early 1900's. He had seen men die from disease, survived hostile Indians, guided a raft up & down the Amazon river, & dealt with more bugs, wild animals, & danger than one would like to see in a lifetime.But all of those things are what Fawcett lived for.
While he was trekking through the jungle his wife Nina & their 3 kids, Jack, Brian, & Joan, were living in England (and a few other places along the way) trying to survive being the family of a diehard explorer. Throughout the book we see the family struggling to get by & live everyday. But they were loyal to Fawcett until the very end.
David Grann the author also tells his story & his search for Fawcett 80 years after his disappearance. Although it is unclear if Fawcett ever found Z, Grann is able to get the whole story & discover what the explorer could not.
We also get to see the world changing on the page with inventions the like car & the radio springing up along the journey. The hunger for adventure & the fierce competition for world wide fame are very evident between the explorers that were Fawcett's rivals like Dr. Alexander Hamilton Rice, the man who discovered Machu Picchu & a man that went on one of Fawcett's expeditions, biologist James Murray.
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Likes: Overall the book wasn't bad. I feel like this book, like most other historical nonfiction books, gives too many details in some respects & not enough in others.
Getting to read about history being made & the changing world was really interesting.
It's really too bad that they never did find out what really happened to Fawcett, it's really just speculation & myth at this point.
The pictures included were interesting & fun to look at.
I enjoyed watching the movie, it was a good rendition of the book.
Dislikes:-
Rating:
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As far as the book to movie comparison I didn't write up a big long list like I usually do. The book was pretty long & had A LOT of information so there was too much to keep track of.
Overall I felt like the movie portrayed the book well & hit the major points. I will say that the movie was a heavily romanticized version of the book.
Some of the main differences were that the final trip did not include Raleigh, the author of the book David Grann was not included in the movie at all, it was just about Fawcett's journey. The movie also depicted Fawcett as more of a family man than he is portrayed in the book.
In the end our book club thought the book was better!
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