For logistical reasons, my family's 2016 Christmas get-together took place in my childhood home town of Tunbridge Wells. As I don't drive (in the real world - gamebooks are a different matter) and public transport doesn't run on Christmas Day (nor even Christmas Eve in some instances), I had to travel down a couple of days in advance, so I took advantage of the opportunity to check out the local second-hand and charity shops while I was there. In the (since then closed) Barnardo's shop near Tesco, a small bundle of books caught my eye. Four slim trade paperbacks in a browse-proof criss-cross of wrapping ribbon. While the packaging prevented me from looking in the books, and from seeing anything more than the spines of the middle two, I could still get a proper look at the front cover of the top book and the back cover of the fourth one, and between the slogan 'Live or die, YOU decide' on the former and the blurb on the latter, it was easy to confirm that this was a series of gamebooks I'd not previously encountered.
What little the ribbon permitted me to read made it clear that Tracey Turner's Lost books were all about trying to survive in hostile environments. No fantasy or SF elements, definitely no Smoke Monster, just a selection of real-world perils. Which was not a problem in and of itself - Edward Packard's similarly-themed Mountain Survival had been one of the more enjoyable of the Choose Your Own Adventure books I'd read back in the 1980s. Nevertheless, being unable to get a proper look at the books made me wary.
The local library was only a few minutes' walk away, so I went there and used one of the public computers to do a little research, thereby discovering that gamebook fandom had little to no awareness of the series. While that meant that there were no reviews to indicate the quality of the writing and playability, it also meant that the books were obscure enough to have some tradable value even if they turned out to be rubbish, so I went back to the shop and bought them.
An attempt at the first book, Lost in the Jungle of Doom, made a few things clear. Firstly, it was nowhere near the worst gamebook I'd ever played. Secondly, the back cover's claim 'With choices on every page...' was incorrect - some pages are informative sidebars, some merely redirect the reader to a new page, and around a score of them end in character death. Thirdly, the book could be tricky. My character got eaten by a black caiman because of a decision prompted by advice in a sidebar. But that wasn't one of those annoying 'gotcha!' incidents found in some gamebooks, just a reflection of the fact that what would normally be a sensible course of action may prove inadvisable when other factors come into play.
Assorted distractions kept me from replaying Jungle or attempting any of the others in the series until recently. But, while I was pretty inactive on this blog during the first half of the year, I was still playing gamebooks some of the time - just concentrating on ones I didn't plan to cover here. When it comes to interactive fiction that's low on the 'game' aspect (little to no random element, fewer and lengthier sections), I tend to repeatedly read the books until I've gone through every section. Or gone through all the decisions and found that there is no in-story way of reaching some sections (whether through authorial intent or error). And that's what I'm currently doing with Jungle. Which is what led to a new discovery about the book.
I had assumed that every choice had just one non-lethal option. So after my first failure this year (getting eaten by the same black caiman under slightly different circumstances), I decided to get some of the dead-end choices out of the way before having another go at completing the book. Otherwise, once I finally beat the book, my obsessive side would compel me to follow up victory with a long series of idiotic demises just so I could tick the 'Read' box for Jungle on my book database. Thus, on my next replay I chose to venture into the cave I had previously avoided and find out the nature of the occupant that would kill me.
Only I didn't die. At least, not upon entering the cave (that didn't happen until I carelessly trod on a bushmaster and got lethally bitten several decisions later). It turns out that, just as some not-inherently-bad decisions nevertheless have fatal consequences, so some sub-optimal choices turn out not to lead straight to death. My loose characterisation of the Lost gamebooks as a variant of the 'puzzle book' subgenre was less accurate than I'd thought, so maybe it would be worth adding them to the list of titles covered in the blog after all. Hence this post.
The adventure starts with my character's regaining consciousness in the wreck of a small plane. I remember that I was on a flight from Bogota to Rio de Janeiro, and that a mid-air collision of some kind - most likely a bird strike - took out one of the propellors and caused the plane to crash. Somehow I survived with only minor injuries, but I'm now alone, somewhere in the depths of the Amazon Rainforest, equipped with only the clothes I'm wearing, a battered metal container salvaged from the wreck, and a Swiss army knife that airport security inexplicably allowed me to retain. Can I make my way back to civilisation, or will I join the ranks of those who disappeared without trace in the Amazon?
After establishing the premise, the book gives me a few pages of exposition. There's a brief summary of different things here that could kill me - large predators, smaller dangerous animals, disease-carrying insects, poisonous plants, contaminated water, flash floods - as well as some description of the local flora (not much undergrowth because the tree canopy lets little light through) and how noisy the place can get, especially when the nocturnal denizens are out and about. A list of survival tips follows, incidentally making the point that my clothes and footwear are fortuitously practical, covering most of my skin but not being too heavy for the climate. So there are a couple of errors in the cover illustration, what with the short sleeves and ankle-exposing trousers depicted.
It's getting late, and I am aware that travelling at night would be a bad idea, but I also need some kind of shelter to protect me from animals that hunt at night. I can build something, or investigate a nearby cave. Since it was the cave that made me aware this book could be blog-worthy, I'll go with that.
As I approach, I become aware of an unpleasant smell emanating from the cave mouth. The ground nearby is soft with droppings, making me aware that something must be occupying the cave already - and then a large cloud of vampire bats flies out. They startle me, but do not attack. Nevertheless, I reflect that they are liable to return before sunrise (if I were Aussiesmurf I'd be tempted to post a photo of Julie Delpy round about now), and decide I'd be better off spending the night elsewhere. A page of facts about vampire bats precedes the next decision, and the mention that they sometimes carry rabies includes a pointer to another fact page which goes into detail about the disease.
Rain begins to fall, and I realise that building a shelter is no longer a practical option. There is another cave not far away, so I take a chance on that one rather than continuing to explore. This cave proves to be unoccupied (and free from disease-carrying corpses), so I cover a patch of the floor with large leaves and my waterproof jacket before bedding down for the night.
A growling sound from outside wakes me. Oddly, the book gives me no choice but to investigate, but that proves informative from a metagaming perspective: had I built myself a shelter, I would have heard the same noise and been allowed to decide whether or not I wanted to find out what was making it, and on both routes it's the same page for taking a look - which means that unless the book is sloppily structured, there's little likelihood of a 'you didn't notice at the time, but you got scratched by a bat and infected with rabies, so you die horribly' ending later on. Such shenanigans - that is, a 'wrong' decision right at the start guaranteeing failure, but no indication that the reader's character already has no chance of winning - are not unheard-of.
Anyway, I cautiously approach the area from which the sound emanated, and eventually notice the jaguar that made the growl. Running away is almost certainly the sort of 'looks like a bad idea' option that will get me killed, so I stand my ground and do what I can to create the impression of being neither threatening nor prey. Slowly backing away, I get out of sight of the jaguar and hear it moving off in search of something unambiguously edible.
That encounter made me sweat, which reminds me that I need to find drinking water. The facing page is full of facts about smart and not-so-clever ways of getting water in the rainforest, with pointers to other pages that say more about getting water from bamboo and the advisability of boiling water. Slightly carelessly, the bamboo info page is also the page for deciding to use bamboo as a water source, so seeking information effectively compels you to make that choice, but it's probably the smartest option anyway, so I'm not massively bothered about it.
Anyway, with the help of some bamboo I get enough drinkable water to slake my thirst, which just makes me aware that I'm also hungry. Close by, a fallen tree has made enough of a hole in the tree canopy to permit some growth at ground level, and the young vegetation includes a tree with fruit that resemble papayas. My character is more familiar with papaya than I am, and cuts open a fruit, discovering that the resemblance continues beneath the skin, and extends to the smell. If it's something toxic, it's doing a very good job of impersonating edible fruit.
The facing page is another informative sidebar, this one on surviving without food and water, which makes the point that you can last a lot longer without eating than you can without drinking. Nevertheless, I'm probably going to have to eat something here sooner or later, and it's less of a risk to sample a fruit that seems identical to something I know I can eat than to try a completely unknown quantity, so I taste a probable papaya, and it turns out to be what I thought it was.
After eating my fill, I contemplate picking more papayas to take with me, but as attempting that is what led to my fatal encounter with a snake the last time I got this far, I will leave the rest of the fruit on the tree, and hope to find something else edible by the time I need to eat again.
For a while I walk on, but my feet are beginning to hurt, so I sit on a handy log and remove my shoes and socks. The soles of my feet are disconcertingly pale and wrinkly. This could be a warning sign of a condition mentioned in an earlier info-dump, which could lead to infection and death, so I'll take a break and hope that giving my feet a good airing will keep things from getting too much worse.
Right choice. A convenient stream enables me to wash my socks, and giving them and my boots time to dry out helps avert, or at least delay, the onset of a potentially crippling bout of warm water immersion foot. Once my footwear is dry again, I put it back on and get ready to resume my trek.
A chirping sound draws my attention to a tiny blue frog at the foot of a tree. I'm pretty sure that bright colours on frogs are usually an indicator that they produce some of the most potent naturally-occurring toxins in the world, so I make a swift departure, hoping that I haven't just missed out on a chance of getting directions to a nearby tavern.
Noise from overhead heralds the arrival of a group of monkeys. They notice me, and stop swinging through the trees. A little disconcerting, but I don't think running away would be an appropriate response. Trying to follow them when they resume their travels might not be advisable, though. Even if they don't get territorial and hostile, concentrating on them would increase the danger of failing to notice something hazardous at ground level.
The monkeys pause for a meal, dropping some fruit and leaves, then swing away. I consider sampling one of the avocado-like fruits, but choose not to push my luck: I've already eaten today, and substances that do no harm to one species are not necessarily safe for another. The list of facts about Amazon monkeys on the facing page says nothing about how their digestive systems compare to humans', but that doesn't mean there's no risk.
Time passes. I decide that I need to find a river, as most of the native human population will live near one. If ghosts existed in this gamebook series, a couple might pop up to mention that black caimans also make use of the rivers, but these books are more concerned with the natural than the supernatural. Following the sound of trickling water, I find a stream and follow it until it joins a river. There's more bamboo close by, and I use some of it to build a raft. Another sidebar gives advice on raft construction, and I hope my character knew the thing about using cross poles to increase sturdiness, because I get no input into the raft-making process.
Drifting down river is a lot less hard work than trudging through the jungle, but also means that I'm no longer in the shade, and the heat of the sun soon becomes uncomfortable. Stopping to build a rudimentary shelter seems like a smart thing to do. In the short term, the exertion of punting to the riverbank makes me feel worse, but more bamboo provides water to stave off dehydration, and the stems provide some of the materials for constructing a crude tepee.
Back on the water and now shielded from the sun, I drift off - in more than one sense. Waking from my doze, I find the raft in shallow water near the riverbank, and see that there's something alive close by. The text says it looks like a small hippo, but the accompanying illustration looks more like a manatee. Should I go back onto dry land, or return to the main stream of the river? If the animal is a hippo, I'd be better off out of the water, but manatees aren't as dangerous, so I'll take a punt on steering back to the current. Yes, that works all right.
Further down the river I encounter some more animals. There are otters swimming in the water. Should I join them? It would be an opportunity to cool down and get clean, and they probably wouldn't be here if there were any major predators in the vicinity. Nor are they likely to pose much of a threat themselves - you can kill an otter in about a second. Except that, rather than being small, they're far away: these are giant river otters, and while they're still not particularly dangerous to humans (the sidebar on giant river otters stresses that they have far more to fear from people), swimming in their midst is not recommended. Still, the distance that caused me to underestimate their size also means that they take a while to reach me, and by the time they get close, I'm back on the raft and out of harm's way.
While keeping an eye out for another source of drinking water, I catch sight of a rowing boat in a clump of trees. It's in pretty shabby condition, and those trees could house something nasty, so I opt not to investigate it. Still, it's an encouraging sign that I'm not the first human to have come to this stretch of the river. And before long I see further evidence of people: a hut made of rusting corrugated iron, with another boat tied up at a rickety jetty nearby. I punt over to the jetty, tie up the raft, and investigate a well-worn trail leading into the vegetation.
Around a bend I find a village, and while I don't speak the local language, that doesn't stop the villagers from providing practical assistance. My wounds are dressed, an air ambulance is summoned, and before long I'm on my way home. Success, on only my fourth attempt.
Several more pages of factual information follow, providing data about the Amazon Rainforest and the people who live in it, and a couple of real-life examples of individuals who survived getting lost there. There's also an index, but I'll avoid that for now, as there's obvious spoiler potential in seeing, for example, which pages mention anacondas. I do still intend to explore the paths not taken, and while there are over a dozen deaths I have yet to encounter, I'm sure there's at least one more viable route through the book, so I can try to finish off with another victory. As far as this blog is concerned, I've finished with the book, but I still have another three in the series, and I note that there are a further two that I don't yet own, so they're going on the want list.
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