Since the age of dinosaurs, Madagascar has thrived in isolation off the east coast of Africa. In this real-life "lost world," hundreds of animal and plant species, most famously the lemurs, have evolved here and only here, while other creatures extinct elsewhere for tens of millions of years now vie with modern man for survival. It's a land of striking geography, from soaring mountains to vast canyon lands, from tropical rain forests to spiny desert. And its people are a conundrum unto themselves, their origins obscure, their language complex and distinct, and their beliefs fascinating. In "The Eighth Continent," Peter Tyson will guide you into this, the planet's most exotic frontier, so you can see for yourself why it's been called "the naturalist's promised land."

Part scientific exploration, part adventure saga, part cultural and historical narrative, "The Eighth Continent" follows Tyson's journeys with four scientific experts as they explore the fourth-largest island in the world:


A herpetologist with a pied piper call to reptiles who has discovered and collected more Malagasy species than any other biologist-and continues to discover more every year
A paleoecologist searching an enormous cavern complex for clues as to why the island's megafauna-Galipagos-sized tortoises, lemurs as big as apes, ten-foot-tall birds, and pygmy hippos, among others-all died out less than two millennia ago
An archeologist trying to answer the most basic and puzzling question about the Malagasy people: Where did they come from?
A primatologist who studies elusive jungle lemurs even as she strives to prevent the island's total ecological destruction
For if Madagascar is one of the most fascinating environments on the planet, it is also one of the most endangered. As the Malagasy hack a subsistence from the island's dwindling forests, they also threaten its diverse habitats and its rich biological diversity. It is not an easy situation to resolve, nor is it easy to answer the burning question at its heart: Can Madagascar be saved? In "The Eighth Continent," Peter Tyson navigates this tortuous path as he delves into the island's storied interior as well as its misty past.

The Eighth Continent: Life, Death and Discovery in the Lost World of Madagascar

The first novel from Madagascar ever to be translated into English, Naivo’s magisterial "Beyond the Rice Fields" delves into the upheavals of the nation’s past as it confronted Christianity and modernity, through the twin narratives of a slave and his master’s daughter.

Fara and her father’s slave, Tsito, have been close since her father bought the boy after his forest village was destroyed. Now in Sahasoa, amongst the cattle and rice fields, everything is new for Tsito, and Fara at last has a companion. But as Tsito looks forward to the bright promise of freedom and Fara, backward to a dark, long-denied family history, a rift opens between them just as British Christian missionaries and French industrialists arrive and violence erupts across the country. Love and innocence fall away, and Tsito and Fara’s world becomes enveloped by tyranny, superstition, and fear.
 
With captivating lyricism, propulsive urgency, and two unforgettable characters at the story’s core, Naivo unflinchingly delves into the brutal history of nineteenth-century Madagascar. "Beyond the Rice Fields" is a tour de force that has much to teach us about human bondage and the stories we tell to face—and hide from—ourselves, each other, our pasts, and our destinies.

Beyond the Rice Fields

Madagascar is the fourth largest island in the world. It is a unique blend of Asian and African culture and is well known as the home of some of the world's most unusual and most endangered flora and fauna, from lemurs to giant tortoises. Although so close to the east coast of Africa, where traces of human existence go back hundreds of thousands of years, Madagascar was uninhabited until about two thousand years ago. How it came to be inhabited by seafaring peoples from present-day Indonesia is just one of the many fascinating aspects of this book. A History of Madagascar examines the origins of the Malagasy, the early contacts with Europeans and the struggle for influence in the nineteenth century between the British and the French. It also covers the colonial period from 1896 to 1960, the recovery of independence and subsequent history up to the early 1990s.

A History of Madagascar

“Everything about Madagascar is surprising,” as Dervla Murphy and her 14-year-old daughter, Rachel, found to their delight. Despite accidents, misadventures, contrasts and the political instability of the Great Red Island, they returned with a lasting respect for the kindness of its proud people.

Muddling through in Madagascar

The Thea Sisters are off to Madagascar for Adventure Camp, a wilderness survival competition! The five friends love exploring and learning about the many plants and animals that live there. But then they discover that they're not alone in the nature preserve -- and endangered animals are under threat! Can the mouselets help before it's too late?

Thea Stilton and the Madagascar Madness (Thea Stilton #24)

In 1986, primatologist Patricia Chapple Wright was given a seemingly impossible task: to travel to the rainforests of Madagascar and find the greater bamboo lemur, a species that hadnt been seen in the wild for thirty years. Not only did Wright discover that the primate still existed but that it lived alongside a completely new species. What followed was a love affair with an animal and a country that continues to this day. In this frank and enchanting sequel to High Moon Over the Amazon, Wright recounts the many challenges she faced, including separation from her daughter, a tempestuous romance with a fellow scientist, and political upheaval that threatens her dream of establishing a national park to ensure the safety of her precious lemurs. But in the end, her tenacity, daring, and passion for this endangered primate lead to extraordinary scientific breakthroughs and help bring the animal back from the brink of extinction.

For the Love of Lemurs: My Life in the Wilds of Madagascar

Two thousand years ago, the island of Madagascar was likely uninhabited. Its unique flora and fauna had gone totally undisturbed by human contact until the first navigators landed on its shores. No one knows where those first inhabitants hailed from, but over the centuries Madagascar developed its own distinctive language and cultural systems. The only recent history of its kind in English, Madagascar, traces two millennia of human activity in one of the world’s most fascinating, yet least-known, societies.
 
In graceful prose, Solofo Randrianja and Stephen Ellis, both leading historians of Madagascar, elucidate the three main phases of its history: the earliest settlements, the age of kingdoms, and the island’s entry into intercontinental systems of commerce and exchange, including over sixty years under French rule. Through the course of this colorful and turbulent history, Randrianja and Ellis explore the tensions between the development of a unique culture and the absorption of immigrants, the development of strong social hierarchies, and the long-lasting effects of slavery and the slave trade.

Madagascar: A Short History

In the extreme south of Madagascar is a place called Berenty, where Tandroy tribesmen, French lords, mad scientists, and two or three species of lemurs may be found gathered peacefully under a tamarind tree. Forty years ago Alison Jolly went to Berenty to study lemurs, and she has been enthralled by it ever since. In Lords and Lemurs she tells the story of the place, its people, and its other animals.
 The owner of Berenty, Jean de Heaulme, arrived there in 1928 as a six-month-old baby, riding with his mother in the sidecar of his father's Harley-Davidson motorcycle. The de Heaulme family has lived at Berenty ever since, supporting Madagascar's fight for independence from France, serving in the government, and enduring economic turmoil, civil war, and even imprisonment. Although they are relics of a colonial system that seized land and tortured dissidents, the de Heaulmes also epitomize noblesse oblige in the best sense of the phrase, showing a remarkable sense of responsibility for both the people and the ecosystem of Berenty. Early on they set aside a large portion of their estate as a nature preserve, where lemurs and other animals have thrived over the years. Jean de Heaulme became a blood brother to one of the local Tandroy nobles -- the kings with spears. Traditionally the Tandroy were warriors who raided for women, cattle, and slaves. Now those who live at Berenty can take what they need from the modern world -- medical care, education, and a cash income -- without giving up their own customs and way of life. Many Tandroy still live in traditional villages surrounded by walls of thorn, and even the men who hold salaried jobs work hard so they can return to their clan with enough cattle to buy a bride or two. When a clan elder dies, the family offers a grandiose funeral where, amid gunfire and dancing and merrymaking and sex, a whole herd of zebu cattle is sacrificed to honor the new Ancestor -- even if he happens to be a Christian. Alison Jolly and her husband were honored to be invited to attend a Tandroy funeral.
 Poignant and colorful, tragic and funny, Lords and Lemurs is a remarkable tale of one of the last great places on earth and the extraordinary people who live there, a tale of marriage, birth, and death, of spear fights and stink fights and dancing. It shows how human warmth and dignity can reach out beyond any social system.

Lords and Lemurs: Mad Scientists, Kings With Spears, and the Survival of Diversity in Madagascar

14-year-old Nathan dreams of fighting pirates in faraway lands. Then his father dies, leaving Nathan penniless. When Tamo, the son of a famous pirate, invites Nathan to join him in Madagascar it seems as if Nathan's daydreams are coming true. Nathan, his sister Maud, and Tamo seem to find adventure -- and danger -- everywhere.

The Pirate's Son

'The seven christians stood together in the bright sunlight, bound with ropes singing a hyme to their foreign saviour as the spearmen advanced. Around them a croud of jostling men, women and children, more than sixty thousand strong...cheered enthusiastically as the spears were driven home and, one by one, the men and women fell and writhed on the sandy ground, their hymn fading slowly into silence...above the still writhing bodies, on a ridge, a score of crosses stood in mute witness, carrying their ghastly burdens, some of whom still lived despite the day and a half they had hung upon the wood.
 
 As European colonists scrambled for control of Africa, a leader arose in the red island of Madagascar who, through ruthless determination thwarted the combined ambitions of all the major world powers. That leader and the author of this holocaust was no warrior but a diminutive woman of middle years, Ranavalona-Manjaka Queen of Madagascar, know to her subjects more simply as Ma Dieu. Under Ranavalona's despotic rule, hundreds of thousands of her people, possibly one-half of Madagascar's entire population, were murdered, starved or simply worked to death by her express command, while she enjoyed an eccentric and debauched lifestyle. For these characteristics, European history has remembered her reign as that of the Female Caligula.

Female Caligula: Ranavalona, the Mad Queen of Madagascar

This inspiring memoir of one woman's experience in the field is an exotic adventure story, a surprise journey of self-discovery, and a deeply personal appreciation of a place that's unlike any other.At age twenty-five, graduate student Keriann McGoogan traveled into the wilds of Madagascar to study lemurs in their natural habitat and to set up a permanent field site in the remote northwest--a site to which she could later return to do research for her PhD in biological anthropology. Despite careful planning, the trip spiraled out of control. Food poisoning, harrowing backcountry roads, grueling hikes, challenging local politics, malaria, and an emergency evacuation would turn a simple reconnaissance into an epic adventure. In an engaging narrative, the author vividly describes the challenges of life in an isolated forest region while also bringing to life the wonders of Madagascar's incredible biodiversity, especially its many varieties of lemurs. Sadly, these rare animals are the most endangered group of primates in the world. At first accompanied by her thesis advisor, McGoogan is soon left alone when her mentor must return home. She carries on as the lone woman amid a small band of local male assistants, diligently conducting research on the lemur population around the camp. But when her right-hand man becomes delirious with malaria, she is forced to lead her team on a desperate three-day trek to safety.This fascinating memoir is equal parts a journey of self-discovery, an adventure story, and a heartfelt appreciation of a wonderful island country teaming with unique species and peopled by the warm and welcoming Malagasies with their intriguing indigenous culture.

Chasing Lemurs: My Journey Into the Heart of Madagascar

The landscapes of Madagascar have long delighted zoologists, who have discovered, in and among the islands baobab trees and thickets, a dizzying array of animals, including something approaching one hundred species of lemur. Madagascars mammal fauna, for example, is far more diverse, and more endemic, than early explorers and naturalists ever dreamed of. But in the past 2,500 or so yearsa period associated with natural climatic shifts and ecological change, as well as partially coinciding with the arrival of the islands first human settlersa considerable proportion of Madagascars forests have disappeared; and in the wake of this loss, a number of species unique to Madagascar have vanished forever into extinction. 
 In "Extinct Madagascar," noted scientists Steven M. Goodman and William L. Jungers explore the recent past of these land animal extinctions. Beginning with an introduction to the geologic and ecological history of Madagascar that provides context for the evolution, diversification, and, in some cases, rapid decline of the Malagasy fauna, Goodman and Jungers then seek to recapture these extinct mammals in their environs. Aided in their quest by artist Velizar Simeonovskis beautiful and haunting digital paintingsimages of both individual species and ecosystem assemblages reproduced here in full colorGoodman and Jungers reconstruct the lives of these lost animals and trace their relationships to those still living. 
 Published in conjunction with an exhibition of Simeonovskis artwork set to open at the Field Museum, Chicago, in the fall of 2014, Goodman and Jungerss awe-inspiring book will serve not only as a sobering reminder of the very real threat of extinction, but also as a stunning tribute to Madagascars biodiversity and a catalyst for further research and conservation.

Extinct Madagascar: Picturing the Island's Past

Ibonia: Epic of Madagascar is a discovery: the first English translation of the major work of Malagasy oral literature, recorded in 1877 from an anonymous bard by a Norwegian missionary and translated by Lee Haring, who was called "the pre-eminent American scholar of Malagasy verbal art" by Research in African Literatures. Ibonia is the epic tale of the birth and exploits of a royal hero. His mother, a queen of heroic caliber, is barren until she consults a diviner, who brings about the hero's conception. An unusual birth and precocious strength prepare the hero to go in quest of his betrothed, who has been abducted. Such tests of worth as combat with a crocodile, supernatural aid, and a victorious struggle with her abductor prove him a true epic hero worthy of ruling his people. Haring's translation makes this Malagasy epic at last available to the general reader as well as to the scholar, also providing extensive notes and translating six shorter variants of the story. In his introduction Haring situates the epic in the history of Madagascar, emphasizing the colonial encounter. Looming large behind the epic is the historical figure of Andrianampoinimerina, the sovereign who made Imerina a conquest state. The introduction also places Ibonia in the context of other forms of Malagasy folklore, showing the bard's reliance on Merina oratorical style. Haring asserts that the brilliance and eloquence of the epic derive from a unique set of circumstances of performance.

Ibonia

Shay is surprised when her husband Senna declares his intention to build her a spectacular dream house on an idyllic beach in the tropical island nation of Madagascar.

But the Red Island House casts a spell from the moment she sees it, and before she knows it Shay has become the somewhat reluctant mistress of a sprawling household, caught between her privileged American upbringing and education, and her connection to the continent of her ancestors.

At first, she’s content to be an observer of the passionate affairs and fierce ambitions and rivalries around her. But as she and her husband raise children and establish their own rituals on the island, Shay finds herself drawn ever deeper into an extraordinary place with its own laws and logic, a provocative paradise full of magic and myth whose fraught colonial legacy continues to reverberate. Soon the collision of cultures comes right to Shay’s door, forcing her to make a life-altering decision.

"A sweeping novel about marriage and loyalty, identity and heritage, fate and freedom, Red Island House reintroduces readers to a powerhouse literary voice and an extravagantly lush, enchanted world."

Red Island House: A Novel

"Lonely Planet: The world's leading travel guide publisher"


  "Lonely Planet Madagascar"
 is your passport to the most relevant, up-to-date advice on what to see and skip, and what hidden discoveries await you. Watch chameleons and lemurs in mountainous national parks, haggle like a local at the Marche Artisanal de la Digue, or snorkel incredible coral reefs; all with your trusted travel companion. Get to the heart of Madagascar and begin your journey now!

Inside "Lonely Planet Madagascar" Travel Guide:



Colour maps and images throughout

Highlights and itineraries help you tailor your trip to your personal needs and interests

Insider tips to save time and money and get around like a local, avoiding crowds and trouble spots

Essential info at your fingertips - hours of operation, phone numbers, websites, transit tips, prices

Honest reviews for all budgets - eating, sleeping, sight-seeing, going out, shopping, hidden gems that most guidebooks miss

Cultural insights give you a richer, more rewarding travel experience - history, local life and customs, arts, cuisine, environment, wildlife.

Over 45 maps

Covers Antananarivo, Central Madagascar, Southern Madagascar, Western Madagascar, Northern Madagascar, Eastern Madagascar and more
The Perfect Choice: 
  "Lonely Planet Madagascar,"
 our most comprehensive guide to Madagascar, is perfect for both exploring top sights and taking roads less travelled.

Looking for more extensive coverage? Check out 
  "Lonely Planet Africa"
. Authors: Written and researched by Lonely Planet.

About Lonely Planet: Since 1973, Lonely Planet has become the world's leading travel media company with guidebooks to every destination, an award-winning website, mobile and digital travel products, and a dedicated traveller community. Lonely Planet covers must-see spots but also enables curious travellers to get off beaten paths to understand more of the culture of the places in which they find themselves.

Lonely Planet Madagascar (Travel Guide)

By definition, "antipode" is a point on the earth diametrically opposite from another. As a field biologist specializing in reptiles and amphibians, Heather Heying has been to some of the most remote places on the globe. Her career consists of trekking through dense rainforests, sitting for hours at a time observing elusive creatures, and spending weeks on end in remote, sometimes inhospitable locales. But nothing she previously experienced quite prepared her for the three seasons she spent studying the tiny, bright, poisonous frogs found only at what is the antipode of her world, both geographically and figuratively - the island-nation of Madagascar.

The majority of Madagascar's wildlife is endemic -- found nowhere else. Lemurs rule the forest canopy, while on the ground, snakes and lizards search for evening meals of frogs and bugs, all against a gorgeous backdrop of rainforest. It's a biologist's paradise - but at times can also be a foreigner's worst nightmare. Madagascar in no way resembles what most Westerners know as normal existence. Technologically, it is laps behind the first world. Time shuffles by at a slow gait. Poverty is rampant - people pride themselves on how many pots of rice a day they eat. Language and culture barriers, combined with bureaucratic red tape, can make travel virtually impossible.

In stories that are in turns moving, insightful, hilarious, and beautiful, Heather recounts her experiences -- from run-ins with naked sailors and unusually hostile lemurs to tropical hurricanes and greedy tourist entrepreneurs. As she carefully navigates an obstacle-strewn path, she gradually uncovers the hidden lives of the beautiful yellow and blue poison frogs she studies. And all the while, she is coming to understand her role as a female Westerner in a foreign society, and her intense love for and fascination with the stunning cultures and wildlife of Madagascar. 


Antipode: Seasons with the Extraordinary Wildlife and Culture of Madagascar

From Papantla in Mexico—"the city that perfumed the world"—to the Indian Ocean islands, "Vanilla" traces the story of the vanilla plant and its secretive trade. From the golden cups of Aztec emperors to the ice-cream dishes of U.S. presidents, vanilla has mystified and tantalized man for centuries.

The only orchid that produces an agriculturally valuable crop, vanilla can mask unpleasant tastes and smells, but also makes pleasant tastes stronger, smoother, and longer lasting. Because it has over four hundred separate flavor components, choosing premium vanilla beans is as complex as judging the aroma and taste of fine wine. Vanilla finds its way into over half of all dessert products sold worldwide, as well as the finest perfumes, well-known brands of rum and vodka, and even Coca-Cola and Pepsi.

Americans consume more vanilla than anyone else on Earth—a fact that has forced growers and traders to mount armed guard over their plants in the tropical jungle. The traders who travel the world in search of America's favorite flavor are a small and secretive elite. Vanilla is a globetrotting adventure that follows buccaneers, aristocrats, and gourmets, all in search of the ice cream orchid.

Vanilla: Travels in Search of the Ice Cream Orchid

In this exhilarating prize-winning novel—only the second to be published in English from Madagascar—a young man comes of age amidst the enchanted origin myths of his island country.

Named after the first man at the creation of the world in Malagasy mythology, Ietsy Razak was raised to perpetuate the glory of his namesake and expected to be as illuminated as his Great Ancestor. But in the chaos of modernity, his young life is marked only by restlessness, maddening insomnia, and an adolescent apathy.

When an unexpected tragedy ships him off to a boarding school in France, his trip to the big city is no hero’s journey. Ietsy loses himself in the immediate pleasures of body and mind. Weighed down by his privilege and the legacy of his name, Ietsy struggles to find a foothold.

Only a return to the “Enchanted Island,” as Madagascar is lovingly known, helps Ietsy stumble toward his destiny. This award-winning retelling of Madagascar’s origin story offers a distinctly twenty-first-century perspective on the country’s place in an ever-more-connected world.

Return to the Enchanted Island: A Novel

Madagascar Travels

Teeming with perilous, exotic locales and widespread examples of social injustice, this bold adventure follows one man's plight to seek his fortune while commenting on the widespread social and economic effects of the African gem trade. Plagued by a bitter divorce and an overbearing father, gem-expert Lonny Cushman flees to the lawless sapphire fields of Madagascar. Homesick and lonely, he dreams of the perfect stone that will fuel an independent career as a gem dealer back in New York and allow him to see his seven-year-old daughter. Finally unearthing the greatest sapphire discovered in the last hundred years, he finds that the power brokers of Diego Suarez want the stone for themselves, and now Lonny must call on all his ingenuity and cunning to escape with his life. Richly detailed and riddled with seedy complexities, this thrilling narrative offers readers a rare glimpse into the culture, the people, and the underbelly of Madagascar.

The Sapphire Sea: A Gemstone Thriller

It's a jungle out there!

Madagascar is the story of four New York zoo animals-a lion who's used to being the center of attention, a zebra who wants to live in the wild, a giraffe who's a hypochondriac, and a hippo who's got attitude to spare-who are taken from the safety of their city homes, loaded on to a boat headed for Africa to be returned to the wild, and then shipwrecked on the island of Madagascar. Can the Zoosters survive in the wild? It really is a jungle out there! 

This gorgeously illustrated retelling of the entire movie is sure to become a family favorite.

Madagascar: The Movie Storybook

Long considered both best friend and worst enemy to humankind, fire is at once creative and destructive. On the endangered tropical island of Madagascar, these two faces of fire have fueled a century-long conflict between rural farmers and island leaders. Based on detailed fieldwork in Malagasy villages and a thorough archival investigation, "Isle of Fire" offers a detailed analysis of why Madagascar has always been aflame, why it always will be aflame, and ultimately, as Christian Kull argues, why it should remain aflame.

Isle of Fire: The Political Ecology of Landscape Burning in Madagascar

This finely drawn portrait of a complex, polycultural urban community in Madagascar emphasizes the role of spirit medium healers, a group heretofore seen as having little power. These women, Leslie Sharp argues, are far from powerless among the peasants and migrant laborers who work the land in this plantation economy. In fact, Sharp's wide-ranging analysis shows that "tromba", or spirit possession, is central to understanding the complex identities of insiders and outsiders in this community, which draws people from all over the island and abroad.

 Sharp's study also reveals the contradictions between indigenous healing and Western-derived Protestant healing and psychiatry. Particular attention to the significance of migrant women's and children's experiences in a context of seeking relief from personal and social ills gives Sharp's investigation importance for gender studies as well as for studies in medical anthropology, Africa and Madagascar, the politics of culture, and religion and ritual.

 This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1993.

The Possessed and the Dispossessed: Spirits, Identity, and Power in a Madagascar Migrant Town

Gifted travel writer, poet, professor of English, and insightful observer of human nature, Colleen McElroy journeyed to Madagascar to undertake a Fulbright research project exploring Malagasy oral traditions and myths. In "Over the Lip of the World" she depicts with equal verve the various storytelling traditions of the island and her own adventures in trying to find and record them.

McElroy's tale of an African American woman's travels among the people of Madagascar is told with wit, insight, and humor. Throughout it she interweaves English translations of Malagasy stories of heroism and morality, royalty and commoners, love and revenge, and the magic of tricksters and shapechangers.

Over the Lip of the World: Among the Storytellers of Madagascar

Lemurs of Madagascar

Welcome to Eden. Population: Zero.

After she finds out her estranged father and sister are missing from their coastal nature reserve in Madagascar, TV zoologist Rebecca Kirkpatrick is on the first flight home. 

Underwater archaeologist Daniel Knox is searching for a sunken Chinese treasure ship when he hears of the disappearances and ventures to The Eden Reserve to investigate.

Still with a vendetta to settle, Georgian gangster dynasty the Nergadzes send a hitman to hunt down Knox and avenge them. As Knox chases answers he realizes that the idyllic coral reef of Eden hides an ugly truth – someone is willing to kill and exploit people for a secret that will rewrite the history of the New World…

The Eden Legacy (Daniel Knox, #4)

Intrigued by tales of the Vazimba people -- a mysterious tribe of white pygmies according to some accounts; an invisible telepathic people according to others -- Mark travels to the ancient 'Isle of the Moon'. Accompanied by his pack bull Jobi, he treks across Madagascar, crossing the forbidden bandit country of the 'Zone Rouge'. Before Mark comes to the end of his quest, and hears the story of the last of the Vazimba at the feet of an old village headman, he must learn to tell myth from reality in a land that has spawned sacred crocodiles, sorcerer-bandits, blood-guzzling spirit animals and a bizarre socialist pirate commune. Mark Eveleigh exuberantly captures the spirit of Madagascar in this magical modern-day adventure.

Maverick in Madagascar

The Rough Guide to Madagascar (Rough Guide to...)

In Stars and Keys: Folktales and Creolization in the Southwest Indian Ocean, Lee Haring introduces readers to the rich folklore traditions of the islands of the southwest Indian Ocean. The culture of Madagascar, Mauritius, Seychelles, Reunion, and the Comoros is a unique blend of traditions that have been brought from Africa, South Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. The folktales from these islands reflect the diversity of this culture and provide a rare opportunity to observe the fluidity of traditions and the process of creolization. Haring presents the tales in a uniquely innovative style: he interrupts the text as if he were reading aloud and directly addresses the reader. His words and those of the storytellers are clearly distinguished, making this folktale collection useful to a wide range of readers and scholars.

Stars and Keys: Folktales and Creolization in the Indian Ocean

Protecting the unique plants and animals that live on Madagascar while fueling economic growth has been a priority for the Malagasy state, international donors, and conservation NGOs since the late 1980s. Forest and Labor in Madagascar shows how poor rural workers who must make a living from the forest balance their needs with the desire of the state to earn foreign revenue from ecotourism and forest-based enterprises. Genese Marie Sodikoff examines how the appreciation and protection of Madagascar's biodiversity depend on manual labor. She exposes the moral dilemmas workers face as both conservation representatives and peasant farmers by pointing to the hidden costs of ecological conservation.

Forest and Labor in Madagascar: From Colonial Concession to Global Biosphere

A journey - both historical and contemporary - among the fantastical landscapes, beguiling creatures and isolated tribes of the world's fourth island: Madagascar.

An improbable world beckons. We think we know Madagascar but it's too big, too eccentric, and too impenetrable to be truly understood. If it was stretched out across Europe, the islands would reach from London to Algiers, and yet its road network is barely bigger than tiny Jamaica's. There is no evidence of any human life until about 10,000 years ago, and, when eventually people settled, it was migrants from Borneo - 3,700 miles away - who came out on top.

As well as visiting every corner of Madagascar, John Gimlette journeys deep into its past in order to better understand how Madagascar became what it is today. Along the way, he meets politicians, sorcerors, gem prospectors, militiamen, rioters, lepers and the descendants of seventeenth-century pirates.

The Gardens of Mars: Madagascar, an Island Story

Betafo, a rural community in central Madagascar, is divided between the descendants of nobles and descendants of slaves. Anthropologist David Graeber arrived for fieldwork at the height of tensions attributed to a disastrous communal ordeal two years earlier. As Graeber uncovers the layers of historical, social, and cultural knowledge required to understand this event, he elaborates a new view of power, inequality, and the political role of narrative. Combining theoretical subtlety, a compelling narrative line, and vividly drawn characters, Lost People is a singular contribution to the anthropology of politics and the literature on ethnographic writing.

Madagascar

The Eighth Continent: Life, Death and Discovery in the Lost World of Madagascar

Peter Tyson

Beyond the Rice Fields

Naivo

A History of Madagascar

Mervyn Brown

Muddling through in Madagascar

Dervla Murphy

Thea Stilton and the Madagascar Madness (Thea Stilton #24)

Thea Stilton

Thea Stilton and the Madagascar Madness (Thea Stilton #24)

Thea Stilton

For the Love of Lemurs: My Life in the Wilds of Madagascar

Patricia Chapple Wright

Madagascar: A Short History

Solofo Randrianja

Lords and Lemurs: Mad Scientists, Kings With Spears, and the Survival of Diversity in Madagascar

Alison Jolly

The Pirate's Son

Geraldine McCaughrean

Female Caligula: Ranavalona, the Mad Queen of Madagascar

Keith Laidler

Chasing Lemurs: My Journey Into the Heart of Madagascar

Keriann McGoogan

Extinct Madagascar: Picturing the Island's Past

Steven M. Goodman

Ibonia

Anonymous

Red Island House: A Novel

Andrea Lee

Lonely Planet Madagascar (Travel Guide)

Lonely Planet

Antipode: Seasons with the Extraordinary Wildlife and Culture of Madagascar

Heather E. Heying

Vanilla: Travels in Search of the Ice Cream Orchid

Tim Ecott

Return to the Enchanted Island: A Novel

Johary Ravaloson

Madagascar Travels

Christina Dodwell

The Sapphire Sea: A Gemstone Thriller

John B. Robinson

Madagascar: The Movie Storybook

Billy Frolick

Isle of Fire: The Political Ecology of Landscape Burning in Madagascar

Christian A. Kull

The Possessed and the Dispossessed: Spirits, Identity, and Power in a Madagascar Migrant Town

Lesley A. Sharp

Over the Lip of the World: Among the Storytellers of Madagascar

Colleen J. McElroy

Lemurs of Madagascar

Russell A. Mittermeier

The Eden Legacy (Daniel Knox, #4)

Will Adams

Maverick in Madagascar

Mark Eveleigh

The Rough Guide to Madagascar (Rough Guide to...)

Rough Guides

Stars and Keys: Folktales and Creolization in the Indian Ocean

Lee Haring

Forest and Labor in Madagascar: From Colonial Concession to Global Biosphere

Genese Marie Sodikoff

Lemurs of Madagascar

Russell A. Mittermeier

The Gardens of Mars: Madagascar, an Island Story

John Gimlette

Lost People: Magic and the Legacy of Slavery in Madagascar

David Graeber