Title: Lost City of the Monkey God
Author: Douglas Preston
Audience: Adult
Rating (scale of 1-10): 9
TL;DR: Amateur archaeologists scour the Honduran
jungle for traces of a legendary lost civilization.
Appeal: Fast-paced, suspenseful
Longer review:
The Mosquitia region of Honduras
harbors the densest and least-explored jungle in the Americas. Now impinged
upon mostly by drug-smugglers, Mosquitia once was home to a culture that
rivaled the Maya in their sophistication and the size of their cities. Before
the events chronicled in this book, the history of that lost civilization was
confined to a few small archaeological finds and a whole host of legends. One
rumor spoke of an abandoned city deep in the jungle where a huge idol of a
monkey lay partially buried: the lost city of the monkey god.
Often dismissed as local legend
or the stories of charlatan treasure hunters, it was up to a team of obsessive
searchers to run down the legend and establish it as fact or fiction. Douglas
Preston, in his capacity of writer for National Geographic and other
publications, was along for the very bumpy ride. Whether the jungle hides a
lost city or not, it certainly hides deadly snakes, prowling jaguars, swarms of
disease-carrying insects, and in politically-troubled Honduras, perhaps
drug-smugglers and revolutionaries. Preston’s pedigree as part of a
thriller-writing team shines through, and the book leaves the reader just as
breathless as if they were themselves scrabbling through the jungle underbrush
in search of an ancient city lost to the knowledge of men.
Read-alikes: Luckily,
tropical exploration seems to be a pretty rich area when it comes to adventure
writing. There are plenty of choices for read-alikes by subject - these
two were popular enough that they’re probably in most collections.
The Lost City of Z: by
David Grann - Journalist Grann traces the fate of a British explorer who never
returned from an expedition to discover a lost civilization in the depths of
the Amazon. A few years old now, but being turned into a movie, and so
back in the public eye.
River of Doubt: by Candice Millard - Teddy Roosevelt, fresh off an election defeat, ventures into the Amazon on an ill-planned expedition to map an unexplored region. With the former president wounded and infected, the trip takes a turn towards disaster.
~ Seth Warburton
