In Search of Lady Ayahuasca: An Ill-Conceived Quest Through the Peruvian Amazon

Zach Zimmerman struggles with long-term commitment. After dropping out of the University of Southern California and moving to Peru for seven months, Zach ultimately discovers that, in every respect imaginable, he’s broke. No money. No plans. No purpose. Of course, if he were normal, this is the point when he’d beg his parents for a flight home. Instead, Zach decides this is the appropriate time to venture alone into one of the deadliest and most unpredictable regions of the planet: the Amazon rainforest. See, according to some guy Zach met in the south of Peru—a guy with a distinct fondness for psychedelics—there exists a spirit of the jungle, and this spirit has a name: Lady Ayahuasca. Local legend holds that Lady Ayahuasca is a divine mother, an omnipotent presence that guides all those who seek her counsel to their true, enlightened paths. Zach, a devoted skeptic, puts little stock into the proposed existence of jungle spirits, yet is nevertheless intrigued by their growing popularity, particularly among New Age travelers, and expects at the very least to find some level of excitement in a land of such great unknown. What Zach doesn’t expect to find is the tarantulas and alligators and shamans and native Amazonian tribes and pretty Chinese girls and eccentric characters that, chaotic and random and dangerous as they may appear, all seem to be leading him somewhere, until, in the end, Zach discovers (well, let’s not leave any spoilers here). Though at its outset, In Search of Lady Ayahuasca is a humorous examination of the abstract, seemingly incredulous beliefs we humans are drawn to, at its heart it’s about a young man struggling to find his own way in a world of beaten-down paths. Zach Zimmerman’s guile and self-deprecatory humor make his journal hard to put down, and his insightful stream of consciousness regarding the nature of skepticism and spirituality will have you reflecting inward as you laugh outward. Plus, it’s only like a hundred pages.