The Last Train to Zona Verde: My Ultimate African Safari by Paul Theroux

Theroux is at his best when he tells [people's] stories, happy and sad . . . Theroux's great mission had always been to transport us beyond that reading chair, to challenge himself--and thus, to challenge us. -- Boston Globe Paul Theroux's best-selling Dark Star Safari chronicled his epic overland voyage from Cairo to Cape Town, providing an insider's look at modern Africa. Now, with The Last Train to Zona Verde, he returns to discover how both he and Africa have changed in the ensuing years. Traveling alone, Theroux sets out from Cape Town, going north through South Africa, Namibia, then into Angola, encountering a world increasingly removed from tourists' itineraries and the hopes of postcolonial independence movements. After covering nearly 2,500 arduous miles, he cuts short his journey, a decision he chronicles with unsparing honesty in a chapter titled What Am I Doing Here? Vivid, witty, and beautifully evocative, The Last Train to Zona Verde is a fitting final African adventure from the writer whose gimlet eye and effortless prose have brought the world to generations of readers. Everything is under scrutiny in Paul Theroux's latest travel book--not just the people, landscapes and sociopolitical realities of the countries he visits, but his own motivations for going where he goes . . . His readers can only be grateful. -- Seattle Times If this book is proof, age has not slowed Theroux or encouraged him to rest on his achievements . . . Gutsy, alert to Africa's struggles, its injustices and history. -- San Francisco Chronicle Editorial Reviews Thoroughly engrossing-from Cape Town to Namibia to the Okavango Delta, Theroux is his inimitable, delightfully grouchy and incisive self...At times tragic, often comical and always gorgeously written, this is a paean to a continent, by a writer unafraid to give it some tough love. -Washington Post He has no illusions about the fact that he is just a passing visitor (a privileged one at that), but that doesn't make his observations, or exquisite writing, any less engaging. -Entertainment Weekly (Best Book of the Year) Theroux is at his best when he tells their stories, happy and sad...Theroux's great mission had always been to transport us beyond that reading chair, to challenge himself-and thus, to challenge us. -Boston Globe If this book is proof, age has not slowed Theroux or encouraged him to rest on his achievements...Gutsy, alert to Africa's struggles, its injustices and history. -San Francisco Chronicle Everything is under scrutiny in Paul Theroux's latest travel book-not just the people, landscapes and sociopolitical realities of the countries he visits, but his own motivations for going where he goes...His readers can only be grateful. -Seattle Times A rich story often laced with irony, the work of a keen observer, full of colorful encounters...Ever the astute questioner, ever the curious reporter, ever a forthright witness to history and the dilemma of the oppressed, alert to political thuggery, he chronicles the crises facing the sub-Sahara. -New York Journal of Books Theroux takes you on a rocky safari across infringed wilds, disenfranchised poverty and coven luxury. He introduces you to a boil of angry indigenous peoples and unsettled migrants you won't meet on an itinerary tour....Go on, turn the first few pages. Then I dare you to put it down. -Charleston Post-Courier As in the best of his many books, Theroux convincingly takes you along for every manic bus ride. His wonderment is yours, whether he's contemplating eating a flyblown leg of chicken, dealing with a ferocious Angolan border guard, or deciding that this time, he's had quite enough. It's a remarkable, teeth-gritting tale -Everett Potter His ability to map new terrain, both interior and exterior, and to report from places that seldom make the news, remains undiminished. -Booklist ( starred review) Theroux's prose is as vividly descriptive and atmospheric as ever and, though a bit curmudgeonly, he's still wide open to raw, painful interactions between his psyche and his surroundings. -Publishers Weekly (starred review) In this intensely personal book, Theroux honestly confronts racism, stigma, privilege and expectations...Reading this enlightening book won't only open a window into Theroux's mind, it will also impart a deeper understanding of Africa and travel in general. -Kirkus (starred review) - - From the Publisher ...thoroughly engrossing...Theroux is his inimitable, delightfully grouchy and incisive self. Alert, questioning, taking pains to ensure that his reader understands Africa's complicated history...If you're thinking The Last Train to Zona Verde is a journey from bliss to sorrow, you wouldn't be wrong. But it's a journey worth taking. At times tragic, often comical and always gorgeously written, this is a paean to a continent, by a writer unafraid to give it some tough love. - The Washington Post - Marie Arana The dean of travel writers recoils from southern Africa's heart of darkness in this disillusioned, heartsick travelogue. Theroux (The Great Railway Bazaar; etc.) recounts his back-roads trip from Cape Town to Angola, a valedictory for happier African sojourns. There are fascinating vignettes of a fallen Eden: hunter-gatherer folkways of San Bushmen enchant him with their primeval authenticity--until he realizes they are just pantomimes for tourists; at a luxury safari camp an elephant takes its revenge for exploitation. But the main action is Theroux's gradual descent into the urban inferno. By bus and crowded cab he gravitates from the relative cleanliness and order of Namibia into Angola, a hell-hole devoid of wildlife, littered with burnt-out tanks, where sleek kleptocrats lord the oil wealth over desperate, grasping beggars. The lowest circle of the unfixable blight of African cities is Luanda, joyless...hot and chaotic, inhospitable and expensive, grotesque and poor, a vibration of doomsday where children's laughter sounds insane and chattering and agonic... an amplified death rattle. Theroux's prose is as vividly descriptive and atmospheric as ever and, though a bit curmudgeonly, he's still wide open to raw, painful interactions between his psyche and his surroundings. (May 7) - Publishers Weekly The acclaimed travel writer and novelist chronicles his journey through Africa as tourist, adventure-seeker, thinker and hopeful critic. Theroux (The Lower River, 2012, etc.) is the purest kind of travel writer; he offers no tips, no hotels gems or restaurant recommendations, and very few grand, clichd this-is-what-my-journey-taught-me-about-myself moments. Instead, the author dissects a place and its inhabitants, luxuriating in its history and confronting its present reality. In what he terms his ultimate African safari, Theroux manages to incorporate--rather than avoid--the general viewpoints of literature about the continent. He revels in the simple, historical life of the bush but acknowledges its basis in fantasy. He decries the chronic ailments of governments and citizens and still appreciates the vast expanses of beauty, but without the wide-eyed wonder of so many travelers. In this intensely personal book, Theroux honestly confronts racism, stigma, privilege and expectations. He describes both the privilege and the perversity of slum tours and points out Western complicity in what he calls the voyeurism of poverty, which turns poverty itself into a profitable endeavor. After years of travel writing Theroux willingly questions the very relevance of the endeavor. If the narrative occasionally feels repetitive, it is due to the fact that the author is stressing an important point--though his constant ranting about rap music does start to sound like an old man griping. Still, even his age is significant, and Theroux continually demonstrates the wonder and enthusiasm that has led him on so many adventures during his long career. Show me something new, something different, something changed, something wonderful, something weird! he writes. There has to be revelation in spending long periods of time in travel, otherwise it is more waste. Reading this enlightening book won't only open a window into Theroux's mind, it will also impart a deeper understanding of Africa and travel in general. - Kirkus Reviews