This is the true and astounding story of a Peruvian youth from Iquitos who, on a rubber-cutting expedition into the Amazon forest, was taken captive by Amahuaca Indians and carried off to their remote jungle village at the headwaters of the Madre de Dios River. The Huni Kui were savage, cannibalistic tribemen, and Manuel a frightened and inexperienced young man from a radically different culture ; but as he watched his captors and began to pick up theirs habits. He was schooled in the use of the "vision vine", the elaborate ritual surrounding the drinking of this hallucinogenic extract, and the lessons to be llearned from its effects.