A rare and beautiful book [that] illuminates the world of the Yanomama Indians of South America. Donner's prose carries the reader with her on her journey. She paints breathtaking word pictures of the elusive jungle light, captures the moods and feelings, the sights and sounds of the native village, and most astonishingly, conveys the sense of mystery and power still to be found in ritual.-- GLORIA LEVITAS, department of anthropology, Queens College [Shabono's] well-crafted images of the rhythms of life among gentle 'primitives' are indelible.-- Newsday If Margaret Mead and Carlos Castaneda had collaborated, they might have produced something like [Shabono].... It is crammed with adventure, atmosphere, and action.-- The Chattanooga Times Since everything Donner describes is rare -- food, language, people -- hyperbole is hard to resist. And, as Donner convincingly gives the lie to the myth of primitive savages, the Iticoteri themselves are hard to resist.-- Kirkus Reviews [An] unusually beautiful book.-- The Charlotte Observer Shabono -- the name for the hamlets of palm-thatched dwellings where the Yanomama Indians of Venezuela and southern Brazil live -- recounts the vivid and unforgettable experience of anthropologist Florinda Donner's time with an indigenous tribe in the endangered rain forest. Shabono dramatically documents the daily life and mysterious rituals of a disappearing people.