Customer Reviews

Lost On The Amazon (Choose Your Own Adventure)

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My kids say: (8 year old) Sometimes I can not understand what they are saying. (another 8 year old) It is cool that you can choose what people in the Choose Your Own Adventure books do. (6 year old) says he likes the violence... (o...kkkkkay...)
What I say: I've read better Choose Your Own Adventure books. This one is packed with potential and the story line starts out interestingly but then the plot quickly thins out and limps off into various endings. A very short read - even when starting over several times.

Lost on the Amazon by R.A. Montgomery is the 24th book in the Choose Your Own Adventure series (or the 9th if it's the reissue edition). This is one of the rare CYOA books that doesn't have a kid for a main character. Instead you are a doctor specializing in third world diseases visiting the Amazon to help treat the lost villages of the forest people. Unfortunately a previous case has held you up and the expedition's had to go on ahead of you. And then it turns out that they've disappeared after being lured deep into the jungle by the sounds of a mysterious flute. Now you must choice whether to go searching for your friends in the expedition in a small boat with a native, via a rented plane, or wait a few days and go with the River Patrol.

The books I've previously read by R.A. Montgomery have ranged from not very good to bloody awful and I hadn't heard a lot of positive things about this book. But I really enjoyed reading this! It was very imaginative and full of great atmosphere. One example of this is a headdress a tribe of Amazons gives you resembling a bird cage that contains a pair of small green snakes inside it. As you approach the location of your captured friends and hear the hypnotic flute music playing, the two small snakes slither down from the headdress and stick their heads in your ears to block out the music. You'll also encounter giant anacondas, feeding frenzied piranhas, ghosts, huts full of darkness, banditos, and lots more. I had hoped one path would lead you face to face with a giant alligator since the possibility is mentioned at the books beginning but alas it was not to be.

The downside to the writing is that there is absolutely no continuity at all. The source of the magic flute changes from being from one tribe to another or sometimes it's from the jungle itself. You choose one path and on the next page your friends are all dead but you choose another and on the next page your friends are alive and happy without any of your actions affecting their fates. There are two tribes of Amazons for some reason. And one seemingly friendly tribe of Amazons have your missing friends backpacks piled up by a temple yet in no other path are they connected to the kidnapping and it's never explained. The whole book is like this so if a lack of continuity throughout really bothers you you might want to skip this one. I found it a little irritating or confusing at times but the story's so imaginative that it outweighed my annoyance.

There are a few really obvious choices like to go or not go against the gods or whether or not to tell a friend about a seemingly innocuous knife wound. There are also a few non-endings where the story just ends even though your character's adventure has not (both witch doctor storylines end in non-endings the very next page after his introduction). The art in the original book is by Leslie Morrill and it's some of the best I've seen in these books. The only problem is that it apparently was decided to purposely obscured the main character's face and it leads to some awkward panels. I don't know the rational behind this since the character is a specialized doctor and I doubt that mirrors most of our real lives but it severely limits what the artist can portray and that's a shame. The art in the reissued version isn't nearly as good.

Overall this was a fun read that really had me excited to try all the different paths.

I ordered this for my grandsons. They received it a week before I thought they would get it. Very fast shipping.