Patria: Lost Countries of South America

An extraordinary adventure into South Americas epic history

'Absolutely wonderful' DOMINIC SANDBROOK
'A luscious, erudite romp ... a tour de force of literary mezcla' ALICE ALBINIA
'An unputdownable delight' JON LEE ANDERSON
'A magnificent contribution to the Latin American canon' MARIE ARANA

*Winner of the Royal Society of Literature Giles St Aubyn Award*

In this sweeping exploration of the continent's forgotten past, Laurence Blair takes as his waymarks nine countries that cant be found on a map: vanished realms, half-imagined utopias and dismembered homelands. Looking beyond modern borders, he travels to each in turn on foot and horseback, by rail and river to weave an epic of survival, resistance and revolution.

Blairs journey spans five centuries and thousands of miles, ranging from ancient Amazonian civilisations and a rebel Inca dynasty in the Peruvian jungle via a Brazilian Wakanda that defied slavery, Bolivias landlocked navy and the Patagonian power that defeated the Spanish Empire to the African freedom fighters who marched over the Andes from Argentina, and the Napoleon of the New World who led Paraguay to its ruin.

This is the story of South America as is rarely told: at the epicentre of global history and the forging of the modern world.