Madagascar is a medication. Between its amazing tradition and biosphere—ninety percent of its varieties discovered nowhere else—everything is certainly beautiful. But nothing is possible.

The world’s fourth largest island can be its fourth most corrupt nation. The rivers run red.

In 2016, I flew 30 hours over three continents, into a singular adventure across 4000 kilometers of isolation. The streets eviscerate; the poverty steals your heart. The terrain follows, a spider web stranded within your peripheral vision.

In Bandits of Madagascar are man-eating trees and elephant birds, pirates and slaves, lemurs and chameleons and crocodile caves, cattle rustlers and rosewood thieves, and sapphires and silk and solicitude.

What generally lurks, simply over your shoulder, is a crooked spine. Thar become bandits.