GREEN HILL FAR AWAY. [Author SIGNED copy.]

UK,8vo HB+dw/dj,SIGNED,1st edn.FINE/FINE.No owner inscrptn but author's handwritten,blue inked,lengthy dedication and signature: 'For Keith & Sue I'm new to this book signing game,and never know what to say ------- but thanks for being so bloody nice when others were less than helpful Peter' to front free endpaper (ffe) and no price-clip to dw/dj.Bright,crisp,clean,glossy laminated,wrap-around colour pictorial artwork by Mike Codd,illustrated dw/dj with white lettering to front; with negligible shelf-wear or creasing to edges and corners - no nicks or tears present.Spine/backstrip of dw/dj ubiquitously but lightly sunned/ faded and some minor,superficial indents - without penetration or affecting the boards beneath to either panel.Top edges with light, sporadic foxing/spotting from light dust-soiling,fore-edges similar but to a much lesser degree,overall generally bright and clean; contents bright,tight,clean,solid and sound - virtually pristine - no dog-ear reading creases to any pages' corners,appears unread - apart from my own collation.Bright,crisp,clean,sharp-cornered,publisher's original plain dark green cloth boards with bright,crisp,blocked gilt letters to spine/backstrip,and plain white endpapers - aforementioned inscrptn excepted.UK,8vo HB+dw/dj,SIGNED,1st edn,9-446pp [paginated] includes XVI(16) chapters; plus [unpaginated] SIGNED ffe,half-title+title pages,a dedication and title separator page.
As you read these words - as you read his very word - the Ache Indians of Paraguay are being systematically destroyed.These beautiful and peace-loving people are being shot,dynamited, mutilated, tortured and crucified.Those that escape this bloody torment are gathered into compounds by American missionaries - whose ideas about conversion to Christ are monstrous - and with their faces to the wall,their spirits broken,they die.
This ghastly programme of extermination was instigated (and with the collusion of the neighbouring Brazilian Government) and supervised by President Stroessner,a son of German immigrants. He has subjugated Paraguay for over twenty years (then 1976).He was to stay in power from 1954 until 1989,ruling with an iron fist for the longest period in the country's history. Peter Upton,a young British journalist,visited Paraguay in the spring of 1975 and saw for himself the horrors of this genocide and - his presence discovered by the Secret Police - was fortunate to escape with his life.Out of this horrifying experience comes his magnificent debut novel 'Green Hill Far Away'. Michael Stewart,a young Roman Catholic priest,finds himself unable to cope with the problems of listening to boring catalogues of sexual misdeeds in the confessional in his Edinburgh parish so he seeks another way of serving God.Called as a missionary, lonely,but filled with the conviction of being able to lead a simple people to Christ,he arrives in Paraguay at the river town of Puerto Callado,where,to his horror,he finds people living under a feudal system.He promises God his best endeavours but when one of his girl pupils disappears it sparks a chain of discoveries about the people - more appalling than he could ever have imagined. [For Stroessner,throughout his dictatorial rule,Brazil gave him unswerving support,including flushing out and eliminating armed exile groups operating in the early 1960s from clandestine bases in its territory close to the Paraguayan border.When he was overthrown in February 1989 in a putsch by his own army chief,Andrés Rodríguez, Stroessner was whisked off hours later to exile in Brasilia,where he would spend the rest of his days protected by the Brazilian government.
The second,connected source of opposition is the role of Brazilian commercial farmers,in particular the way that they have bought up most of the tierras malhabidas - eight million hectares of virgin forest land illegally distributed to 'family and friends' by the Stroessner regime in the 1970s and 1980s under the cynical guise of land reform. Paraguayan resentment has focused on the flouting of laws to halt deforestation,the illegal use of GM crops and the unwillingness to implement a fifty-metre limit on crop-spraying close to local communities.] The author worked as a staff news reporter with 'The Western Morning News' in Torquay for 12 years but when he heard of the atrocities that were being perpetrated in Paraguay he gave up his job with the paper and ventured,alone,to Paraguay to do his research for this book.He worked under cover,gathering the horrifying information which forms the basis of 'Green Hill Far Away' but was forced to leave the country when a man he trusted revealed his purpose to the Security Police - an organisation credited within Paraguay with the murder of an Interpol agent and with the disposal of other 'snoopers'. Please contact rpaxtonden@blueyonder.co.uk ,because of the weight/value of this item for correct,insured shipping/P+p quotes - particularly ALL overseas buyers - BEFORE ordering through the order page! ** N.B. ALL buyers please note,stocks' actual shipping/P+p costs are adjusted and any difference is refunded,after order's receipt and before the order's despatch,especially if the item(s) are offered either P+p included/FREE.
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