The Last Island, Adam Goodheart
The Last Island, Adam Goodheart
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The Last Island
Discovery, Defiance, and the Most Elusive Tribe on Earth

Author: Adam Goodheart

Narrator: Will Tulin

Unabridged: 5 hr 39 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 09/26/2023

Synopsis

In November 2018, a zealous American missionary was killed while attempting to visit an island he called "Satan's last stronghold," a small patch of land known as North Sentinel in the Andaman Islands, a remote archipelago in the Indian Ocean. News of the tragedy fascinated people around the world. Most were unaware such a place still existed in our time: an island unmolested by the advances of modern technology.

Twenty years before the American missionary's ill-fated visit, a young American historian and journalist named Adam Goodheart also traveled to the waters off North Sentinel. During his time in the Andaman Islands, he witnessed another isolated tribe emerge into modernity for the first time.

Now, Goodheart—a bestselling historian—has returned to the Andamans. The Last Island is a work of history as well as travel, a journey in time as well as place. It tells the stories of others drawn to North Sentinel's mystery through the centuries, from imperial adventurers to an eccentric Victorian photographer to modern-day anthropologists. It narrates the tragic stories of other Andaman tribes' encounters with the outside world. And it shows how the web of modernity is drawing ever closer to the island's shores.

About Adam Goodheart

Adam Goodheart is a historian, essayist, journalist, and bestselling author of 1861: The Civil War Awakening. His articles have appeared in the Atlantic, the New York Times, National Geographic, and the American Scholar. Goodheart is the director of Washington College's Starr Center for the Study of the American Experience. He lives in Washington, D.C., and on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Brendan on July 07, 2024

To colonize or not to colonize, that is the question. Adam Goodheart wrestles with this quandary in his book The Last Island. The island we are talking about is North Sentinel Island near India which has a tribe of isolated people. You may have heard of it when an American went to the island to try......more

Goodreads review by Udit on February 25, 2024

It is indeed a story of the Andamans and the most elusive tribe in the world. Having read about the sentinelese this book didn't offer me anything new. But still it's an important read because the story fascinates. It's true that sometimes the book feels like a compilation of different sources but t......more

Goodreads review by Mike on February 23, 2025

This book was unimpressive. It is not a history of the Andaman Islands or the Sentinelese. It is almost a travelogue. There are some interesting points regarding the history of the islands and the Jarawa tribe. The discovery of missing portfolios of photographs of the islanders was interesting. The......more

Goodreads review by Shannon on August 29, 2023

An interesting little book, not what I expected when the blurb was talking about contact with an isolated island, but that's partly what makes this such a cool story. This isn't Captain Cook and Hawaii, or Cortez and the Aztec. This all happened so recently. It's amazing to think of the Internet bei......more

Goodreads review by Shweta on October 31, 2023

I liked the way the author has compiled all the information about the civilization's history and its accounts of attempted colonization along with his observations during his two expeditions, years apart. The book is precise and doesn't drag or overly express views, rather states facts bluntly. The......more

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