Laibon: An Anthropologist's Journey with the Diviners of Samburu in Kenya, is a brilliant ethnographic review by Elliot Fratkin, which intricately details the emic and ethical observations essential to the study of an anthropologist. Elliot begins with a rather brilliant vision, but it quickly turns into an extraordinarily fortuitous event that fits perfectly with the African proverb that graces the book's preface: First folly, then wisdom. In this essay I will begin by describing the ethnographic journal, then analyze many aspects, evaluate and critique the strengths and weaknesses, and finally examine the many contributions of this book to the understanding of the anthropology of religion. The book takes place in northern Kenya, in the Lukumai region. community of the Samburu people. The people of Lukumai are pastoralists who move their community based on the need to keep their cattle, camels, goats and sheep in a desert environment. Elliot maintains the focus on his adoptive father, Linyoki, who is a laibon, while also writing about the "nomadic community of camel herders" (2). Elliot, who was a graduate student, originally wanted to write about the Maasai of East Africa, who were also pastoralists (3). His intentions were not to write about a single "tribe" and, like many anthropologists, he wanted to "go to places that hadn't been talked about" and live in isolated areas (3). Ironically, he did what he decided not to do, but in doing so, he made relationships that made him the man he is today. Elliot mentions in the preface that "the book is both a memoir of [his] own experiences as an anthropologist and an ethnography, an anthropological description of the laibons, who are a particular family of diviners, prophets, men -medicine and sorcerers. ..... in the middle of paper ...... you are far away when you are alive” (33). It’s a lot like my life because I’ve traveled a lot; however, when I am around certain people and environments, that place becomes my “home.” Fiona Bowie wrote that "[t]he task of an ethnographer remains to interpret the views of others as honestly and responsibly as possible and to place these views and practices within a theoretical framework." wider (Bowie, 12). Elliot does just that, but in a way that can't be replicated without a lifetime of work in the field. This book contributes intimately to the anthropology of religion, in such a way that it contextualizes much of what the course covers, but leaves an everlasting impression on me. I emphatically suggest that this be read by any student studying anthropology, so that the student can understand the implications of the "journey" that they may undertake during their fieldwork..