Paul Theroux, the travel writer and novelist, spent three decades in close friendship with V.S. Naipaul, one of the twentieth century's most acclaimed and controversial writers. This memoir recounts their relationship from their first meeting in Uganda in 1966, when Theroux was a young Peace Corps volunteer and Naipaul an already-famous author, through their travels together and eventual bitter falling out. Theroux presents Naipaul as brilliantly perceptive, devastatingly witty, and almost comically difficult: demanding, stingy, cruel to his wife, and capable of shocking callousness toward friends who had helped him. The book raises uncomfortable questions about the costs of literary genius and the power dynamics of mentorship. Theroux examines his own motives in sustaining a friendship with someone who treated him badly, acknowledging his own ambition and need for Naipaul's approval. He recounts their travels through Asia and South America, showing how Naipaul observed the world with the intensity that made his books extraordinary while also displaying the prejudices that made them controversial. The final breach, when Naipaul cut him off without explanation, clearly still wounds Theroux. This memoir offers both an intimate portrait of an important writer and a meditation on friendship, influence, and the difficult question of how much bad behavior talent can excuse.