Hunting the Gugu: In search of the lost ape-men of Sumatra

This was a bit of an underwhelming read for me. Some spoilers below, so decide before reading on...I have a number of Benedict Allen books in my shelves, and read his famous [b:Mad White Giant 988539 Mad White Giant Benedict Allen https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1180028819s/988539.jpg 974032] years ago, and enjoyed that. I had relatively high expectations for this despite the whimsical subject matter.For me this read more a a book about Allens journey than any results, and not necessarily his physical journey, perhaps more his lack of foresight for what this expedition turned into - a bit of a farce...Basically, Allen falls is enticed to accompany Theodore Hull (not his real name) on an expedition into Sumatra to track down ape-men - common in the native folk-tales. Hull's health, however, takes a turn for the worse, and Allen is left feeling committed to go on the expedition alone. Armed with a list of names from Hull, Allen tracks down some of these people, many though, are no longer in Sumatra. These people offer varied levels of assistance, but eventually Allen spends some time deep in Sumatra with the Kubu people, an animist aboriginal tribe, and tries to find eye witness accounts of sightings, and goes in search of the ape-men, or Gugu as they are known.There are some interesting parts, but there is a lot of predictable description of the travel, the jungle and the obvious disappointment of finding nothing to support the existence of anything other than the known monkeys and ape species. The book also ends strangely, with him being abandoned by his guide in the jungle, and in a fit of panic cuts his chest open, leaving him to self-apply five rough stitches to seal the wound. There is no explanation as to how he finds his way out, we simply get a postscript saying that ‘In the end, before I came down from the mountain, I recovered my backpack, the bow and arrows.'Overall a short but strange book. Struggle to pitch up more than two or two and a half stars.