I obsessed with Mali, so I thought this book might be good tour of the country down the Niger river. Instead it's another lame explorer veneration, this time Scottish explorer Mungo Park. The best travel advice I ever got, also traveling as a woman alone in a nearby area, was that a country is more than its landmarks, and that you should try to get to know as many people as you can if you really want to know what a place is like. I feel like she barely makes an effort to engage with people, nor does she even do a great job describing the landmarks. She mostly just talks about herself, her physical condition and her fear of villagers. The book is way too self-absorbed and self-congratulatory but not in the way where you can draw out any universal themes about humanity. Not highly recommended.

good but doesn’t come close to how mental her other book is (3.5)

Mali is a place I've wanted to visit for years. Sadly that dream is on hold now due to the political situation there, but I was happy to find this book in the local library nonetheless.

Subject matter aside, travel writing seems to have a popular style these days. Maybe you like it; I do not, and this book made me realize that fact. In this modern idiom, the writing is always in the present tense, and rarely does a noun pass without an adjective's adornment. The adjectives themselves are all from the same barrel that includes "verdant", "vibrant", "forbidding", and maybe the least interesting of all, "colorful". How these ten-cent words add anything to the narrative, I have no idea. Worse, little things are remembered in such fine detail as to strain credibility. Does she really remember the sun's glint off her paddle, or the stare of a goat? I suspect the broad strokes are factually recounted, but when all the little details work out "just so", credibility creaks and strains.

If this style of modern travel writing doesn't bother you, I guess she's not the worst at it, and the story itself is compelling enough. Still, a recommendation: her trip was spent retracing much of the route that early explorer Mungo Park took down the Niger; his account is freely available online, and is quite compelling and readable, despite being written in the early 1800s. As for me, I'm off travel writing for a while, maybe for good.

Thoughtful account of the author's improbably difficult solo journey down the Niger river to Timbuctu, in a kayak – an inflatable kayak! Salak is gutsy and perceptive, plus she writes well. Her description of the villages along the river and the widely varied responses--ranging from welcoming to harassing to abusive--that she received as she paddled by in her red kayak seemed symbolic to me of the strangely disparate world that we all float through. You never do really know what's around the bend.

3.5

good luck

This book is awesome. I don't often like adventure travel books written by women because of the "girliness" factor in them. The author stays away from that and sticks to the excitement and danger she experiences as well as the people she meets.

A friend sent me this and it was a very inspirational story.

More fascinating tales of adventure from Dr. Salak. She is among the best in this genre if not the very best. At times she seems reckless but she is always very smart and well prepared. Her journey of kayaking to Timbuktu was very different from how I thought it was going to be. The closing scenes in the book were the type of sagas that stay with you for a long time.

After reading this book, I am completely convinced Kira Salak is the reincarnation of Mungo Park--back to finish his mission of reaching Timbuktu by way of the Niger River and living to tell about it. I suspected this early on, but it wasn't until toward the end of her journey that it became clear--that moment when she finds herself in a riverside village during a fierce storm wandering the roads shouting "Hey Mungo...Mungo Park!" into the harsh wind and rain as villagers watched from their huts.

Having read Ms. Salak's previous nonfiction book, FOUR CORNERS, I was so pleased to find a level of maturity and wisdom in this book that was lacking in the other. In FOUR CORNERS, she seemed both lost and driven in her pursuit to explore Papua New Guinea, and took unnecessary risks that not even she could understand why. But in THE CRUELEST JOURNEY, we have a woman who can articulate why she would undertake such a dangerous journey (traveling the Niger River by kayak, facing village after village of possibly hostile natives). Weaving in the story of an 18th century Scottish explorer named Mungo Park who also undertook this journey, we're given a glimpse into the wonder and madness that accompanies intrepid travelers that spans the ages. I really loved this book, and I appreciate Ms. Salak's candor in sharing herself and her experiences. We may not always agree with or understand her desire to explore remote parts of the world, but her courage (both on and off the page) lets us come along for the ride.

Kira Salak is a badass.

My first thought when I heard that the author travelled, all alone from Segou to Timbuktu was: Is she stark raving mad? Africa is a dangerous place, especially for a woman.

But the journey she described was insightful and shed light on the adventures of Parks, who attempted the same feat but vanished.

It was a very nice read and recommended.