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Common Knowledge

Birthdate: 1969 or 1970
Gender: male
Nationality: USA (resident)
Netherlands (birth)
Birthplace: Groningen, The Netherlands
Places of residence: Netherlands (birth)
Tarawa, Republic of Kiribati
Fiji Islands
California, USA
Prague, Czech Republic
Canada
Education: George Washington University (MA|1995)
Boston University (BA|International Relations)
Occupations: consultant (World Bank)
author
anthropologist
essayist
travel writer
Organizations: World Bank (consultant)
Short biography: Jan Maarten Troost (known professionally as J. Maarten Troost) (born 1969 in The Netherlands) is a Dutch-American travel writer and essayist.

From 1992-94, Troost worked as a correspondent for The Prague Post, where he wrote about everything from the dissolution of Czechoslovakia to the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina. He has also worked as a consultant to the World Bank.

Troost was born in Groningen, The Netherlands in 1969, and is of Dutch-Czech descent. He was educated at Boston University (B.A.) and The George Washington University (M.A.). He has lived in the Netherlands, Canada, the Czech Republic, Kiribati, Vanuatu, Fiji, and the United States, where, after a long stint in California, he presently resides in the Washington D.C. area with his wife and children.[from

J. Maarten Troost in Wikipedia retrieved 11/25/17]

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Memoir-couple move to isolated tropical island atoll in Name that Book (May 2012)

Reviews

The Sex Lives of Cannibals: Adrift in the Equatorial… by J. Maarten Troost

Recommended by the fabulous Sara, just fun easy travel writing... despite the fact that it claims not to be. :) Great read for my first few months on a Pacific island.

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Kiramke | 68 other reviews | Jun 27, 2023 |

Headhunters on My Doorstep: A True Treasure Island… by J. Maarten Troost

This is the fourth book in the travelogues by J. Maarten Troost, better known for his hilarious "The Sex Lives of Cannibals." Like his other books, "Headhunters" details his explorations and witty observations on life in the South Pacific, this time specifically following the trail that Robert Louis Stevenson laid out in his own voyages in the South Seas well over a century earlier.

Whereas the other books are erudite and witty travelogues, worth it for their entertainment value, "Headhunters" has that as well as the author's reflections on his own struggles with addiction, in a way that manages to be entertaining, insightful, and well-woven into the fabric of the travelogue.

This is my favorite book by J. Maarten Troost so far, because of having all the same tongue-in-cheek humor as his other books and also being more revealing of his own struggles and insights arising from them.… (more)

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Ricardo_das_Neves | 8 other reviews | Jan 14, 2023 |

The Sex Lives of Cannibals: Adrift in the Equatorial… by J. Maarten Troost

I enjoyed this very much. It was very informative, humorous and self-conscious. Like the author, I did not really know what to expect from Kiribati and it surprised me a lot. The life on an overpopulated, polluted and really small atoll in the middle of the mightiest of oceans far far away from the world of the dry land felt really claustrophobic at some moments and like a fantasy world at others.

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dacejav | 68 other reviews | Jun 28, 2022 |

The Sex Lives of Cannibals: Adrift in the Equatorial… by J Maarten Troost

Don’t let the title scare you (or entice you). It was probably the Publisher's idea (or perhaps the author's) to get your attention. But the book is more a PG-13 humorous travel / adventure book about a two-year stint on a third world island chain than anything titilating about sex or cannibals. His travel / adventure takes place in the island country of Kiribati (yes, it really exists. I believe its the island group previously known at the Gilbert Islands, lying in the cross hairs of the equator and the International Date Line). In our world of readily available foods and goods, it's interesting to see a little of how so many other peoples live. The writing style isn't necessarily one of classic literature, but sounds more like it's written by your funny neighbor. And that made it easy to relate to, more human and personal. It's an enjoyable story, with humorous situations, worth a summer read at the beach.
… (more)

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rsutto22 | 68 other reviews | Jul 15, 2021 |

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