Journalist Alex Caudros spent six years of immersive reporting and research, with support from the Fund, for his new book, “When We Sold God’s Eye: Diamonds, Murder, and a Clash of Worlds in the Amazon,” published by Hachette in the U.S. and excerpted in The Guardian. The book tells the story of the Cinta Larga, an Indigenous group that had no contact with the West until the 1960s and came to run an illegal diamond mine in the rainforest. Caudros gained their trust as no journalist has ever done before, ultimately making 10 extended trips to interview the group’s members. He pored through tens of thousands of pages of government documents to show how the Brazilian state, USAID and the World Bank accelerated the group’s demise and the destruction of the rainforest. Narratively, the book follows three Cinta Larga who were kids when the first highway was built through their lands, up through a massacre in which they were accused of killing 29 prospectors. The book shows how prosecutors falsely accused several Cinta Larga of being involved in the massacre. The Washington Post calls the book “powerful,” and Publishers Weekly says, “readers will be riveted.”
‘Powerful’ grantee book chronicles Indigenous group’s struggles in the Amazon
