A biography of Francisco Pizarro, an explorer who conquered a gold-rich empire that enriched Spain for decades.

First published in 1555, Cabeza de Vaca's narrative of his South American expeditions is a detailed account of his five years as governor of Spain's province of the Rio de la Plata in South America. Cabeza de Vaca was already a celebrated explorer by the time he went to La Plata, known for his great trek across North America in the 1520s and 1530s and for the Relación he wrote about that journey. His tales of his river and forest explorations in South America show that he had lost none of his early curiosity and drive. He was the great secular champion of the native peoples of the New World and the only Spaniard to explore the coasts and interiors of two continents. This book is one of the great first-person accounts of the Spanish conquest of the Americas in the sixteenth century. Morrow's new translation makes Cabeza de Vaca's adventures available to a wide English-speaking audience for the first time.

A narrative history of exploration from Christopher Columbus to the 19th century, with journal excerpts, diaries and other writings of the explorers themselves. Goodman has marshaled his wide-ranging research and lifelong interest in exploration into a comprehensive, scholarly history. A reprint of the original 1972 edition, the tales have lost none of their luster.

A KIRKUS REVIEWS BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR From the New York Times bestselling author of The Invention of Nature, comes a breathtakingly illustrated and brilliantly evocative recounting of Alexander Von Humboldt's five year expedition in South America. Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) was an intrepid explorer and the most famous scientist of his age. His restless life was packed with adventure and discovery, but his most revolutionary idea was a radical vision of nature as a complex and interconnected global force that does not exist for the use of humankind alone. His theories and ideas were profoundly influenced by a five-year exploration of South America. Now Andrea Wulf partners with artist Lillian Melcher to bring this daring expedition to life, complete with excerpts from Humboldt's own diaries, atlases, and publications. She gives us an intimate portrait of the man who predicted human-induced climate change, fashioned poetic narrative out of scientific observation, and influenced iconic figures such as Simón Bolívar, Thomas Jefferson, Charles Darwin, and John Muir. This gorgeous account of the expedition not only shows how Humboldt honed his groundbreaking understanding of the natural world but also illuminates the man and his passions.

Inspired with youthful dreams of being an explorer, 23-year-old Benedict Allen travelled from the mouth of the Orinoco to the mouth of the Amazon. Allen stumbled on his own through the Amazonian jungle, so coming face-to-face with the harsh reality of being alone in the midst of potentially hostile territory. Allen's first published work develops into a tale full of mishaps, dangers - and sheer bloody endurance. He records how the experience of living in the jungle with Indians taught him how to survive - an ability he quickly found he needed to use.

The inspiration for the major motion picture "The Lost City of Z," mystic and legendary British explorer Colonel Percy Harrison Fawcett spent 10 years wandering the forests and death-filled rivers of Brazil in search of a fabled lost city. Finally, convinced that he had discovered the location, he set out for the last time toward destination “Z” in 1925, never to be heard from again.This thrilling and mysterious account of Fawcett’s ten years of travels in deadly jungles and forests in search of a secret city was compiled by his younger son, Fawcett's companion on his journeys, from manuscripts, letters, and logbooks. An international sensation when it was first published in 1953, Exploration Fawcett was praised by the likes of Graham Greene and Harold Nicolson, and found its way to Ernest Hemingway's bookshelf. Reckless and inspired, full of fortitude and doom, this is a book to rival Heart of Darkness, except that the harrowing accounts described in its pages are completely true. To this day, Colonel Fawcett's disappearance remains a great mystery.