Daniel Everett took his family to convert the Pirahas (pronounced pee-da-HAN), a remote people of the Amazonian jungle whose language no outsider had yet been able to understand. They encountered malaria, snakes, jaguars, spiders, insects, and a plot to kill them as they slept. But Everett gradually gained entry to this curious culture, and gave up trying to Christianise it. Along the way he discovered a language which disproved the most established tenets of linguistics.

'Dan Everett has written an excellent book. First, it is a very powerful autobiographical account of his stay with the Piraha in the jungles of the Amazon basin. Second, it is a brilliant piece of ethnographical description of life among the Piraha. And third, and perhaps most important in the long run, his data and his conclusions about the language of the Piraha run dead counter to the prevailing orthodoxy in linguistics. If he is right, he will permanently change our conception of human language.' - John Searle, Slusser Professor of Philosophy, University of California, Berkeley'This is an astonishing book: a work of exploration, into the most distant place and language, but also a revelation of the way language is shaped by thought and circumstance.' Ben Macintyre, The Times'Astonishing... a warm tribute to this people's unique way of seeing the world... full of wonder while conveying the fragility of the Piraha way.' Waterstone's Books Quarterly

Daniel Everett was born in California. He lived for many years in the Amazon jungle and conducted research on over a dozen indigenous languages of Brazil. He has published on sound structure, grammar, meaning, culture and language. He has been the subject of endless controversy in academic circles and is currently Professor of Linguistics at Illinois State University.