Reviews

See my book reviews on Amazon.com
See menu of all book reviews on this site

This is the true story of the kidnap and survival of scientists by freedom fighters opposed to the Indonesian government.  The story is written in an active and engaging style of "reportage and descriptive writing."  Start was the British biologist leading a scientific expedition investigating and cataloguing various plants and animals, and specifically focusing on the fish in an isolated region of the island's mountain jungles.

He had taken an expedition of zoologists from Britain to Indonesia, after months of negotiation with the government and excruciating paper work and delays at various bureaucratic levels.  They were stationed in Irian Jaya, on the island of Papua, on the Indonesia side near the border with the independent Papua New Guinea.

High on the mountainous spine of this island shared between the two countries, this international troupe of scientists were taken hostage by Papuan rebel warriors in Irian Jaya.  The author has a lot of good information on the cultural characteristics of the various tribes in Irian Jaya.  The group was working primarily in the Nduga tribal lands, the village of Mapnduma.

Start writes the book in diary format, but with the full discussion and background, carrying us with him through the halls of the government mazes, then finally along the ridges and through the jungles of the region he has wanted to explore and catalogue.  Likewise the daily details of the ordeal he and his colleagues endured are recorded in clear, scientific detail.

But though clinically clear, the pathos is not missing.  We feel the stress Start and his colleagues experienced, the injuries, the insults, the uncertainty.  This is truly an adventure story.  Its excitement is only heightened by the chilling realization that this really happened.

See this book on Amazon.com.
See my book reviews on Amazon.com
See menu of all book reviews on this site
See my reading lists
Many other books have review notes with the reading list entry

OBJ

First reading notes written 26 August 2006
Expanded version posted on Amazon 18 February 2009
This version posted on Thoughts and Resources 19 February 2009

Orville Boyd Jenkins, EdD, PhD
Copyright © 2009 Orville Boyd Jenkins
Permission granted for free download and transmission for personal or educational use.  Other rights reserved.

filename:  startirianjaya.html