Yanoama

The Story of Helena Valero, a Girl Kidnapped by Amazonian Indians

by Ettore Biocca

Kodansha International, 1996, paperback, ISBN 1568361084

Very Good Condition, minor edge and shelf wear, uncreased spine

'In 1932, the daughter of a miner, just eleven years old, was kidnapped by the Yanoami Indians of northern Brazil.  For more than twenty years Helena Valero lived in their villages, where she married twice and bore four children.  later she and her children left the village and returned to Sao Paulo, only to find that their true and proper home was in the forest.  Valero is now an elderly woman, and still lives in the region today.
Italian anthropologist Ettore Biocca published Valero's compelling life story in 1965, when it was immediately acclaimed as both a dramatic personal narrative and a uniquely intimate portrait of Yanoami life, challenging preconceptions about these supposedly "warlike" people.  Today, as concern grows worldwide about the changes sweeping the Amazon basin and its indigenous peoples, her story makes even more timely and important reading.'