Monte Reel's biography of the Victorian adventurer Paul du Chaillu is an eye-opener. du Chaillu was the first Westerner to see gorillas, and brought specimens back to London, just as Darwin's Origin of Species was fuelling an acrimonious debate about the relationship between primates and man. He was unintentionally caught up in this debate, and became the target of eminent men determined to destroy his reputation to further their cause.

Reel paints a portrait of a man who was, in his way, almost a complete cypher, yet was the inspiration for many in science, literature and even film. He was a colleague of Richard Burton, Algernon Swinburne, Richard Owen, Conan Doyle and many other Victorian luminaries. Jack London, R.M. Ballantyne and other writers owed a debt to him, and even the movie King Kong was partially inspired by him. And yet his origin, his early life, his scientific expeditions and even his death remain shrouded in mystery and controversy. A really engaging read. ( )

Very fascinating history. If the description sounds in any way interesting to you, by all means give it a read. The book is exceptionally well-written. ( )

The book's Title and sub-title provide a basic description of what's to follow, but Monte Reel's story of Paul Du Chaillu and his African explorations surprised me in several ways. I'd never really thought about when and where the gorilla became known to the industrialized nations, but I would have guessed it was hundreds of years earlier than this book revealed. The reluctance of many in the Royal Societies of England to accept the validity of Du Chaillu's discovery of the gorilla is both amusing and sad. Reel describes the difficulty of many Christian fundamentalist's in England in accepting the controversial theories of Darwin regarding evolution, and the near simultaneous discovery of a potential "missing-link" only added fuel to the fire. Also, "Between Man and Beast" gives the reader a taste of what central African exploration was like, and the hardships of the explorers is hard to fathom.

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First, a note: I received a galley of this book from the publisher. An engaging, well-crafted nonfiction account of an explorer who has been largely lost to history (at least popular history). This is pitched as a book that David Grann's fans would appreciate, and as a fan of David Grann, I was riveted. Reel is clearly a writer who understands that a great narrative, with tension, conflict, and uncertain outcomes, can propel a reader through material (like a great adventure story) and I think he's done an admirable job of doing this here. But this is popular history--anyone looking for a discussion about why the discovery of the gorilla threw the evolution conversation into disarray won't find much depth here, and given the subtitle, I was a little disappointed in that. But Reel has rehabilitated Du Chaillu's reputation, given the reader a glimpse into the rarefied world of the uniquely British hierarchy of science and science minds, made historical figures come alive, and ended with an exceptionally poignant image. ( )

This book has a lively style, and is written in short chapters. It fails on the front of promising to delve into the evolution controversies of the 19th century in some depths, and then doesn't. But as a narrative of the life of Paul Chaillu, the explorer of Gabon, and the discoverer of the Gorilla, it does an adequate job. It also has short bios of many of the figures of the evolution struggle, but not much depth on them. It does give an example of the general shape of academic conflicts, so has some value there. I'd call it good summer reading. the picture are adequate, and there could have been better maps.
Du Chaillu provided sensationalist fiction with two stereotypes, The Great White Hunter and the Crazy Scientist. ( )