Get our Best Book Club Books of 2025 eBook!

What readers think of The Lost City of Z, plus links to write your own review.

Summary |  Excerpt |  Reviews |  Beyond the book |  Read-Alikes |  Genres & Themes |  Author Bio

The Lost City of Z by David Grann

The Lost City of Z

A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon

by David Grann
  • BookBrowse Review:
  • Critics' Consensus (7):
  • Readers' Rating (1):
  • First Published:
  • Feb 24, 2009, 352 pages
  • Paperback:
  • Jan 2010, 416 pages
  • Rate this book

About This Book

Reviews

Page 1 of 1
There is 1 reader review for The Lost City of Z
Order Reviews by:

Write your own review!

warren

Lost City of Z Disappoints
I really wanted to like this book and, after the first few chapters, was really getting into it. The book turned out to be primarily about the wanderings of Col. Fawcett in the Amazon, and very little about the lost city. There are a few debates about whether or not the Amazon can support large populations, but that's about it. At the end the author invests a few pages in what "could" have been the lost city, and then....that's it. Book over. I didn't even get much of a sense that Fawcett really conceived the idea of a lost city and then developed an "obsession" to find it.

I bought the book after listening to Mr. Grann do a talk show. I feel I must have bought the wrong book.

There were no maps, except for inside the covers. There was a lack of detail in many areas, such as, if the expedition is well into Amazonia, and are totally spent and half-dead from starvation and disease, how did they get out in order that they undertake the next expedition? Just way too many loose ends for me. Sadly, this is a case where the movie should have no trouble being better than the book.

There is one silver lining I found in this book. After reading the exceptional descriptions of all the things that can kill you in the Amazon basin, I will NEVER visit a place that has an indigenous creature like the candiru.
  • Page
  • 1

BookBrowse Book Club

  • Book Jacket
    Lessons in Chemistry
    by Bonnie Garmus
    Praised by Parade and The New York Times Book Review, this debut features a 1960s scientist turned TV cooking star.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    The Original Daughter
    by Jemimah Wei

    A dazzling debut by Jemimah Wei about ambition, sisterhood, and family bonds in turn-of-the-millennium Singapore.

  • Book Jacket

    Serial Killer Games
    by Kate Posey

    A morbidly funny and emotionally resonant novel about the ways life—and love—can sneak up on us (no matter how much pepper spray we carry).

  • Book Jacket

    Ginseng Roots
    by Craig Thompson

    A new graphic memoir from the author of Blankets and Habibi about class, childhood labor, and Wisconsin’s ginseng industry.

  • Book Jacket

    Awake in the Floating City
    by Susanna Kwan

    A debut novel about an artist and a 130-year-old woman bound by love and memory in a future, flooded San Francisco.

Who Said...

When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign...

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

B W M in H M

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.