Four travelers meet in Bolivia and set off into the heart of the Amazon rainforest, but what begins as a dream adventure quickly deteriorates into a dangerous nightmare, and after weeks of wandering in the dense undergrowth, the four backpackers split up into two groups. But when a terrible rafting accident separates him from his partner, Yossi is forced to survive for weeks alone against one of … one of the wildest backdrops on the planet. Stranded without a knife, map, or survival training, he must improvise shelter and forage for wild fruit to survive. As his feet begin to rot during raging storms, as he loses all sense of direction, and as he begins to lose all hope, he wonders whether he will make it out of the jungle alive.
The basis of an upcoming motion picture starring Daniel Radcliffe, Jungle is the story of friendship and the teachings of nature, and a terrifying true account that you won’t be able to put down.
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I’m glad I saw the film before reading the book, because it helped me to picture the places – much less frustrating than film-after-book, when you’re always too aware of what has been left out.
This is the sort of story that makes you think ‘if this was fiction you would say it was far-fetched’. Yossi, Kevin and Marcus, backpackers in Bolivia, fall in with the mysterious and clearly dodgy Karl Ruprechter, if indeed that was his name, and get talked into going on a potentially dangerous adventure in the jungle. After many setbacks and difficulties, the group splits up: Karl and Marcus to go back to a village, and Kevin and Yossi to carry on downriver, traversing a section that even experienced rafters would not attempt. The worst happens (lots of it), the two get split up, and Yossi survives for three weeks in the jungle, on his own, in the middle of the rainy season.
The book is perfectly structured, with lengthy background about how Yossi teams up with the others and how they fall in with Karl, all of which makes for a good understanding of the mens’ personalities and why various decisons and mistakes were made … then comes the increasingly worrisome trek into the jungle, all the time with the suspense building as you wait for everything to go horribly wrong. And I mean HORRIBLY wrong. What Yossi went through defies description, and I was totally gripped all the way through.
As for what happened to Karl and Marcus, I will not give any spoilers….
It’s not a perfect book; some unnecessary animal cruelty (I mean when they were ill-treated, or hunted for sport rather than when necessary for food) was hard to stomach, there were times when I thought the editing was a little sloppy (a fair few repetitions), and I thought there was too much detail about Yossi’s daydreams and hallucinations in the jungle, but on the whole I couldn’t give this book anything less than five stars, because I loved it, to the extent that I am just googling stuff to find out more, and locate pictures. And I don’t think I’ll be able to read anything else for a couple of days – always the sign of a thoroughly good book!
It’s a story of youthful optimism and naïveté, of comradeship, incredible resilience, bravery, the best of human nature and the worst – and of how the less you have, the more you value the small and seemingly insignficant. Highly, highly recommended, but watch the film first.
I couldn’t put the book down
It is nonfiction at its best.
Loved this book, very adventuresome. Hard to believe anyone can endure what these men went through. I just watched the movie and it followed the book perfectly.
The book was a realistic and sobering view of survival and risk in the Amazon jungle. It makes you feel like you are right with him.
Makes you think twice about trusting others if you have to depend on them for your life. Always do your own research
Wow!
It’s an amazing tale of survival against the Amazon jungle, but the writing style is sleep inducing.
An amazing true story. Very impressive.
Not the best writing, but a compelling story.
Not worth reading. Slow
Fascinating to a city-girl reader. Even the well-prepared and experienced can face more problems than they can imagine! I will stay close to home.
Fantastic true story of being lost in a real jungle. I would. Give this a 10 rating if that was possible!!
Love the story of struggle and determination. One never knows how strong they are until faced with danger.
The characters are believable, of course it was based on facts.
This book was really awesome. It was s true story