Matheu DeSilva – “Falling to Fly” | San Miguel Literary Sala

Literary Sala Member Event

Matheu DeSilva – “Falling to Fly”

Wednesday, November 21
5:00 PM

 Sala Quetzal in the Biblioteca 

Admission Free

Falling to Fly with Biographer and Novelist Matheu DeSilva

By Susan Page

In 2011, a gold miner named Jason Pednault was brutally attacked in a remote jungle by two native tribesmen. He was beaten, strangled and thrown off a 150-foot cliff into rushing rapids. Through a combination of mysterious intervention and extreme determination, Jason survived. Now, seven years later, he’s an activist, teacher, protector and facilitator for various conservationist causes and an advocate for indigenous rights.

The story of how this unassuming man from small-town Arkansas ended up in the Ecuadorian Amazon, the details of the fateful day that nearly killed him, and his subsequent personal transformation are revealed in the travel/adventure bestseller Falling to Fly from biographer and novelist Matheu DeSilva.

Jason Pednault first approached the British author DeSilva in 2015 to ask if DeSilva would ghost-write an account of Pednault’s survival story. During their ensuing meetings, however, it became clear that the scope of Jason’s story was much larger than either had initially suspected. The result is a stunning book that reads like the best of novels. By turns hilarious, mysterious, heartbreaking and exhilarating, it’s sometimes easy to forget that Falling to Fly is in fact a true story — until we reach the end and are called to consider some uncomfortable questions about ourselves and how our choices impact the wider world. Falling to Fly is a compelling and optimistic read, just not one for the faint-hearted!

Matheu DeSilva will give a presentation of Falling to Fly at Sala Quetzal in the Biblioteca on Wednesday, November 21 from 5:00 to 7:00 pm. This event is free of charge, and will include a reading, a short video filmed at the location of Jason’s attack, and a discussion of the book’s themes and the processes involved in bringing the story to life on the page. Signed copies of Falling to Fly will be available for purchase from the author.