IN TROUBLE AGAIN: A Journey Between the Orinoco and the Amazon

by Redmond O'Hanlon ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 1988

Ripsnorting jungle high jinks by the British author of Into the Heart of Borneo (1985). When O'Hanlon, a Times Literary Supplement editor, decided to take a four-month trip into the Amazon rain forest, he asked poet James Fenton, who'd gone with him to Borneo, to come along. ""I want you to know,"" Fenton replied, ""that I would not come with you to High Wycombe."" And no wonder: once in the jungle, even as the discomforts and dangers multiply like the black flies that threaten to devour O'Hanlon and his crew, the author's lust for ever wilder trial grows. Never mind that his new buddy--London Club manager Simon Stockton--and the rough pack of hired hands led by the Indian Chimo (""the toughest-looking old man I'd ever seen"") want to turn back time and again; O'Hanlon won't quit until he attains his goal of making contact with the Yanomami, ""the most violent people on earth."" So he endures the bites of fire-ants and an assassin bug; the sting of a black scorpion; close calls with a fer-de-lance and a giant bird-eating spider; attack by an anaconda: dining on piranha and monkey head (""I picked it up, put my lips to the rim of each socket in turn, and sucked. The eyes came away from their soft stalks and slid down my throat"")--until he at last meets the Yanomami, who promptly aim curare-tipped arrows at his heart: ""'Real Yanomami!. . .' I thought in a rush of pleasure and relief and adrenalin. 'Doing exactly what they're meant to do!' And then, 'Jesus Christ,' I thought, 'they're going to kill me.'"" But of course they don't, with O'Hanlon visiting their village, partaking of a hallucinogenic drug, and sneaking off at dawn when his trinkets run out. Well-placed extracts from the works of the explorers who preceded him, and generous heapings of jungle lore and observations, make this an erudite as well as exciting account--a memorable blend of wit, courage, and often heart-pounding adventure.

Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1988

ISBN: 0679727140

Page Count: -

Publisher: Atlantic Monthly--dist. by Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1988

Categories: NONFICTION