A legend in the arena of wildlife conservation and affectionately hailed as the 'Snakeman of India', Romulus Whitaker has had a lifelong love affair with the 'fierce creatures' that share our planet. This first volume of his fascinating memoir brings the India of the 1950s and the US of the 1960s to life. When his mother married and moved to Mumbai, Whitaker was transplanted from a conventional childhood in the US to what was for him the exciting world of India. At boarding school in Kodai, he kept a pet python under his bed and realized that all he really wanted to do was work with snakes. Sent to the US for college, Whitaker preferred snakes to lecture halls and left to work in a snake farm. The adventures that ensue are hair-raising and often hilarious.