Gustato spiritu, desipit omnis caro.
Gloria in excelsis Deo.
































KIRA SALAK'S PAPUA NEW GUINEA


A "Mary House"-- Menstruating women are required to stay in this open-air hut during their periods, so they won't "poison" the men of the tribe.

Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea


Casualty of Jungle Travel-- This is what my legs looked like after hacking myself through the interior of Papua New Guinea's jungle.

Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea


Anasi Village-- My character Tobo, in my novel The White Mary, was partly based on the witch doctor from this village.

Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea


Krit Village-- The people in this real-life village were the inspiration for the Krit people ("The Ones Followed by Death") in my novel The White Mary; note how the man is completely covered with grili, or ringworm.

Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea


Scenes from Blackwater Refugee Camp-- I visited the former headquarters of the OPM guerrilla resistance movement, a group which was fighting the genocidal seizure of western New Guinea (West Papua) by the Indonesian military.

Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea


Scenes of Papua New Guinea

Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea


Tribal Art of Papua New Guinea

Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea
Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea


Huli fortune teller with the skulls of his father's lineage

Photos of Kira Salak in Papua New Guinea


Kira Salak's "Four Corners"

FOUR CORNERS: A JOURNEY INTO THE HEART OF PAPUA NEW GUINE
by Kira Salak

Salak undertook an epic, solo jungle trek across the remote Pacific island nation of Papua New Guinea--often called the last frontier of adventure travel. Traveling by dugout canoe and on foot, experiencing the dangers and wonders of a largely untouched world, she became the first woman to traverse PNG. Salak stayed in villages where cannibalism was still practiced behind the backs of the missionaries, meeting mysterious witch doctors and befriending the leader of the OPM guerrilla movement who fought against the Indonesian occupation of Western New Guinea.

The New York Times Book Review selected Four Corners as a Notable Travel Book of the Year, writing, "Kira Salak is tough, a real-life Lara Croft." Book Magazine called her "the gutsiest--and some say craziest--woman adventurer of our day." Edward Marriott proclaimed Four Corners to be "a travel book that transcends the genre. It is, like all the best travel narratives, a resonant interior journey, and offers wisdom for our times."



Kira Salak's "The White Mary"

THE WHITE MARY
by Kira Salak

"A gripping debut novel."
Publishers Weekly Pick-of-the-Week


"There aren't many books that we hand to friends, urging,
'You have to read this.' The White Mary is one of them."
Cleveland Plain Dealer

"Riveting."
Seattle Post-Intelligencer

"With The White Mary, journalist Kira Salak makes a stunning
debut as a novelist. This is a story whose beauty and power
sweeps you along, like the jungle rivers that bear her heroine
into the heart of New Guinea in search of a vanished American."

--Philip Caputo