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Summary: Gaviotas is an inspiring story of hope and success
Review: Gaviotas the place is amazing! I can't believe how many good ideas were put into practice in one community! Incredible. All working/aspiring engineers, city planners, architects, etc. should having a working knowledge of the theories and practices Alan Weisman describes in this book.Humans CAN be part of a non-destructive, even a positive, productive relationship with their surroundings. We CAN prosper without decimating everything with which we interact. Gaviotas is a good start--a good example for the rest of the world. READ THE BOOK! BUY THE BOOK!
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Summary: A vision of humanities existence
Review: Gaviotas I can honestly say that this book completely changed the way I look human existence and relation to nature. Not only are the people of Gaviotas innovators, but visionaries aided by the studies past and present technologies. While reading this tale I was not only amazed by the resourcefulness of a few people, rather what the implications are to the human family as a whole. It seems that the people of Gaviotas have given themselves an education that no classroom can offer. In fact quite the contrary, they are scholars of the laws of nature.
One thing that I learned from this book is that it is easy to get stuck thinking within the parameters of modern society. It seems that every technology around us is based purely on the short term and hard resources. However it is the natural dynamics of Earth which run the resource base for the natural world, the wind, hot, cold and ultimately the sun.
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Summary: Incomprehensible technology
Review: Has anyone actually tried to understand the two big "inventions" the author describes? Can any of you make the "sleeve pump" work given the explanation and diagram in the book? Does the solar water still make any sense? If you can, I would like to hear from you, because I can't. I have raised these points wqith both the author and the publisher but got no help Dave Johnson
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Summary: Hope Floats
Review: I read this book after one of my Colombian friend recommended it. I could not put it down once I started reading it. It is not an easy reading and it requires you to think about how everybody in the western world takes life and facilities for granted which people in countries like Colombia strive hard to achieve. This book is a fantastic tale of individuals who don't take no for an answer, who had a dream and they worked to achieve it and in the process created an outstanding example of the fact that 'life and nature can co-exist' because that is how they were before we made discoveries and inventions to conquer nature. The book ends with a final message...If you have a dream then pursue it...you will meet people along the way who share your thinking...Hope floats.
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Summary: Too chatty; no data, no drawings, poor bibliography.
Review: If you have heard Weisman speak on NPR there is no reason to read this book. If you want to espouse the eco-cause you need to back up ideas for change with data, drawings, annotated biblography. For a journalist, Weisman is too uncritical in his analysis of the problems found at Gaviotas. There may be wonderful things happening in the llanos (especially the reforestation), but little of it seems capable of transfer to other settings. His anti-capitalist bias keeps him from doing cost/benefit thnking, much less analysis. Also, this has far too much "dialog" reporting, so that it is neither fiction nor journalism.
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Summary: Utopia? No. Topia? Yes.
Review: In 1966, when he was 22, Paolo Lugari and his brother drove over barely passable roads to a desolate area 200 miles east of Bogota, Columbia. The llanos area is a poor-soil barren that grows only a few nutrient-deficient grasses, a vast expanse of sun-baked plains in spite of over 100 inches of rain per year. A place of deadly water and hungry mosquitos. Conditions were so daunting that the Columbian government abandoned an attempt to build a road through the area. Lugari saw an opportunity to create something very special. And he did it. Today Gaviotas is a thriving, sustainable community of hundreds of joyous people studying, inventing, producing, singing and dancing amidst a huge forest that they planted. Residents from all walks of life have designed and built, planted and harvested, birthed, nurtured, taught, and entertained. There are teeter-totters that operate super-efficient pumps to bring water to the school, solar heat to cook meals, solar kettles to sterilize drinking water, ultra-light windmills to provide power. The hospital has been designated one of the 40 most important buildings in the world. Some have called Gaviotas a utopia. Lugari insists that, "Utopia literally means no place. We call Gaviotas a topia because it's real." Gaviotas the village is surprising, uplifting, extraordinary. Gaviotas the nonfiction book is as compelling as a novel, as educational as a textbook, as inspirational as the biography of a great person. If you need to rise early, do not take this book to bed with you.
Rating: 
Summary: interesting
Review: In 1998, journalist Alan Weisman collected and presented information about a little known, yet quite monumental, village known as Gaviotas. To get there, one must travel 16 hours by car from the nearest major Columbian city, Bogotá. Even then the path there is not a smooth one; rough, muddy roads and severe political unrest serve as some major barriers in getting to Gaviotas. So why then is such an arduous trip worth it; in essence, Gaviotas is yet another tiny village located in a generally uninhabitable region and possesses none of the modern modes of transportation or communication that we are accustomed to. While in a sense these aspects may be true of Gaviotas, it is also undeniable that this community holds as one of the most efficient, supportive, and thoughtful communities on the planet.
Started in 1971 by a group of Bogotá scientists, Gaviotas originally was created as a sort of scientific experiment, a reaction to the way things were - which clearly wasn't working. A Gaviotas saying goes "the real maturity in life is to realize your dreams" and the founders of Gaviotas did just that when they decided to create their own society. The harsh life and extreme poverty that had been rampant in developing urban areas paired with the blatant depletion of natural resources was enough to spark the idea that maybe there should be a change. Yet instead of trying to make changes in the system already in place, this group of determined individuals took on the radical notion of creating an entirely new, segregated, yet completely self-sufficient, place to live. And that is just what happened.
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Summary: Wonderful, Inspiring, Hopeful!
Review: It was one of the best books I've ever read.
Go get it right now!
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Summary: Optimistic portrait of third-world ingenuity
Review: The third world, particularly Columbia, gets horrible press nowadays for its violent drug-ridden society. Wouldn't you be surprised to learn that the future of humanity lies near the Equator? It's fact, not fiction. If CNN is your only guide to the world, you simply have to read this book because you won't believe it. Break free of the drug war propaganda and read something inspiring.
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Summary: Great book
Review: This book allows us to realize what can be done to save our planet. It shows that it is possible if we want to. It shows how sone scientists and ordinary people did manage to create this peaceful world in harmony with nature. The story is a little bit slow at the beginning but after the first 20 pages, you are hoocked up with the story.
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