Customer Reviews

Bonobo Handshake: A Memoir of Love and Adventure in the Congo

5 star:		(51)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book is fabulous! I got it last week and couldn't put it down - the first page grabbed me and the subsequent ones kept hold of me until I reached the back cover.

Bonobo Handshake is a wonderful mix of story-telling, science, and history melded together to become an engaging memoir. A lot of non-fiction falls into the "dry" category for me, but this book was anything but stodgy. I was able to learn while being entertained - literally laughing and tearing up at different parts of the story - about not only bonobos and chimps but also the DR of Congo, which had previously only existed for me via bloody images on the news.

While I'd hesitate in recommending it to my friend's kids (they're pretty young - I'm not sure I'd be up for explaining the "handshake" to them), I'd DEFINITELY add this to any of my friend's reading lists. FABULOUS!

This rare ability to combine three strong writing themes - politics, science and raw personal history - has never been so beautifully exhibited as in this memoir. The book leaves a reader breathless, with so much to absorb, so much to learn, so much to lament. It is a courageous book that gives us hope, hope that non-violence in the word 'humanity' is there for us to achieve.

Dear Vanessa Woods, I've never written to an author before, but I just HAD to when I finished your book, The Bonobo Handshake. Thank you, thank you, thank you for writing this book! I read a lot of nonfiction, and have long held a fascination for bonobos. This book was a perfect read for a lay person like myself and I learned so incredibly much from it. There aren't many books out there about bonobos, but the way you combine their story with your personal story, and with the huge story that is Congo in Africa is just so impressive and informative. I will now be on the lookout for anything else you write as I do for my favorite authors that include Carl Safina, Rick Bass, Sy Montgomery, Doug Chadwick, Bernd Heinrich, etc.

I will share this book and its story with everyone and look forward to seeing you and your husband's name in print again and will do my best to support the bonobos. Best of luck with all the great work you and everyone in the book are doing!!
Sincerely,
Margaret

This book is not just an animal book (although it gives some great insight into chimps, bonobos, and their close relations to humans.) It's also first and foremost a people book, a journey of a young woman in a new world with a new man trying to find answers and meaning. In that sense, it's a journey that relates to us all. Woods' writing is funny, engaging, frank, and quite revealing, not only about the Congo and Bonobos, but about herself. Her insights are the type where you go, "I've felt that before but never been able to put it into words." Woods does not shy away from the atrocities that happened to both people and bonobos, and in fact, its the correlation that Woods makes between the behaviors of chimps/bonobos and people that makes this book so interesting. While a memoir, it reads like a fiction book, with the depth and breadth that you don't find everyday. Some books are so engaging that they keep you up into the wee hours of the night. This is one.

For those who are familiar with King Leopold's Ghost by Adam Hochschild, will especially appreciate the political update of Congo for the past 22 years from the time of King Kabila Sr., following the Rwandan genocide of 1998. Here in war-exhausted Congo, Woods offers a rare gift - insight into bonobos, the unknown and fast disappearing link to our ancestry. Six million years ago, our last common ancestor with apes split into three different lines, which would eventually become chimpanzees, bonobos and us. Unlike chimpanzees who are war-like, bonobos offer a peaceful coexistence, based upon tolerance. Woods and her husband, Brian Hare, study and compare chimpanzees and bonobos looking for answers to our emotional makeup. What they discover is so amazing, it takes ones breath away. An incredible read, one that moved me to adopt a bonobo within the Lola Ya Bonobo Sanctuary outside Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Here traumatized bonobo orphans are raised to eventually be released into a safe sanctuary. You too may become first, enchanted, then determined to continue such work.
Sue Fleming, Salt Lake City

Bonobo Handshake by Vanessa Woods is based in Congo Africa. Vanessa Woods is a research scientist in California. She is also an author and has worked for NatGeo. Bonobo Handshake is, yes you guessed it right, about Bonobos. How many of us know that Bonobos along with chimps and gorillas are closest to us in terms of gene count? But sadly, world is so focused on chimps that people tend to forget or overlook these relatively small apes.

Vanessa Woods moved to Congo with her boyfriend since he was a research scientist and wanted to conduct research on Bonobos. Having worked with Chimps before and having no interest in Bonobos or Congo for that matter, the move was a huge sacrifice for her. But as she came to know the animals, she eventually fell in love with them.

This book is not just about Bonobos. It's a nice mix of her personal story, the political story of Congo and Bonobos. Congo has suffered extensively for its oil, gold, diamonds, Cobalt and so much more. Instead of strengthening the economy, it has resulted in many wars and suffering. And along with the economy and the people, the wildlife suffered too. People want money and the fastest way to have it is to sell Bonobo's. They are tortured and orphaned. Most of them are sent to the Lola Ya Bonobo sanctuary when found by well-meaning individuals.

It was here, at Lola YA bonobo, that Vanessa and her boyfriend (later husband) conducted experiments on the Bonobos. These experiments are important because other than comparing them to chimps they are also a key to a better world. By understanding the way Bonobos deal with conflicts we could understand more about how humans deal with conflicts too.

I simply LOVED the book. What more can I say? After the first 20 pages I couldn't put it down. You would possibly like it even if you don't like non-fiction because this book is page-turning. It's a detailed, human, interesting and heart warming look into Bonobos and the people who look after them. I fell in love with Bonobo's after reading this book and I'm sure you will too. Since I borrowed this book from the library I hope I find a copy for my personal shelf.

I want a campaign to move this book to the front page of Amazon. Vanessa Woods captures the essential details of human existence in her words, making bonobos a metaphor for human conflicts, love and war, the challenges of conservation, her own marriage and self-development.

We have the backdrop of the Congo and the horrific challenges of people living there -- women in particular. Vanessa gives us a history lesson, not only of the big men and corporations in charge of the Congo, but the ordinary people snatching moments of joy when they find them. The writer sees special beauty everywhere and never damns the Congo landscape with Western judgement. Hugs from bonobos take on a tenderness that transcends their animal status. We feel baby bonobos slipping away from us, as Vanessa articulates the movement of every muscle until they breath no more.

You will view all Vanessa's babies and grownups, too, as unique creatures with much to teach us. Researchers like Vanessa and her husband have demonstrated bonobos's value as a society with different behavior systems and social organization. With bonobos, the ladies are in charge. Vanessa and I communicated by email and spoke on the phone yesterday, about [...], my website, swinging into a long-term fundraising plan for Vanessa and her bonobos.

The conservation movement couldn't ask for a more articulate, genuine writer and fine human being than Vanessa Woods. The bonobos may be gone soon, unless we share our humanity to save them. Yes, one weeps reading this book . . . if one has a bonobo heart like Vanessa Woods. This writer has succeeded brilliantly in her mission to unlock ours.

I really loved this book and could hardly put it down. It's beautifully written - funny, exciting, educational, and heartbreaking. You're taken on a wild ride with the author travelling and working in foreign countries, exposed to violent and war torn Congo, and conservation efforts for Bonobos. I knew very little about Congo before reading this and I can't believe all that the country and its people have gone through. Vanessa gives you an awesome history lesson, without feeling like you're reading a stuffy textbook. The Bonobos at the sanctuary are hilarious, incredible, and endearing animals. The science element of the book is fascinating. All together, an awesome book! Anyone would enjoy reading this and I highly recommend.

everyone should read this book. it will make you literally laugh out loud at times and then you read further and you'll cry. it has the perfect balance of humor and sad reality. i know that sounds weird but vanessa woods masters it brilliantly. it's shocking how many people have never even heard of bonobos. this book deserves more publicity. and vanessa is so cool! i spoke to her on the phone and she's very sweet.

Woods has a distinctive style, and a quirky sense of humor. In fact, I had to go thirty or forty pages in before I got onto her flow, but from there it was non-stop. She's self deprecating, she kisses and tells (poor husband Brian!) but she also brings us all of the life she lived in the place she lived it with the bonobos of Lola ya Bonobo. This is what she did best, I feel, was to bring us the totality, of them, the wonderful people who care for them, the larger (and bloody) unstable political/economic situation that seems to have always shadowed the Congo. The people and the bonobos were as close in her telling as if I sat across a table from them. She has a very good descriptive talent, and an eye that picks up just the right details. It's a very loving, very sobering, very passionate look at our nearest kin (the bonobos) and highlights their precarious place in the future. I hope they make it, such wonderful relatives have so much to show us!