"In truth she did not care. She did not care that the Lakashi were having 3.7 times the number of children as compared to other indigenous Brazilians over the course of their lifetimes. She didn't care where they lived or if they were happy or if they wanted the children they had. What she did care about, cared about very much in fact, was that her employer, who had virtually proposed marriage and then sent her off to the equator after one of Vogel's employees had died there, now refused to share with her the basic information of the research question."
-Marina's thoughts, from the novel
For a number of reasons, I'll rate this book a 2. I found it tedious with its long chapters, some over 35 pages and long paragraphs, often a whole page. I also found the premise rather hard to believe---a drug to extend women's reproductive years into their 70's. Who would want that? And I kept wishing there would be a "little less talk and a lot more action."
Main character Dr. Marina Singh works for a pharmaceutical company which has researchers working on a potentially valuable drug in the Amazon. Chief scientist on the project, Dr. Annick Swenson, will not respond to requests for updates. Mr. Jim Fox, Marina's boss (and lover) sends Anders Eckman, another Vogel employee to locate Swenson, and report on the progress of the research. Later Swenson writes that Eckman is dead but provides no details. Marina is sent to uncover the mystery and hopefully disclose to Fox how the project is moving forward.
Marina finds Brazil both beautiful and potentially dangerous. The insect-infested jungle with anacondas and cannibalistic natives possessing poison arrows would have been enough to have me on the first plane back to the USA! After Marina finally locates Swenson, she finds her challenging to work with, to say the least. Swenson's sarcasm and my-way-or-the-highway attitude is very unpleasant.
Patchett's character development is good. I came to like Easter, Milton and Barbara, especially. I found it very odd that Marina called her boss, and lover, Mr. Fox, whether in a professional setting or not. The Lakashi culture was interesting also. I suppose Ms. Patchett did some extensive research there.
I will stop here rather than risk revealing any spoilers. More after our Page Turner meeting and discussion. I am predicting few in the group will like this one.
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Our group average for this book was 3.2. There were no 5's at all, but only two 2's (one being mine, you may recall). Several members liked the writing style and enjoyed certain aspects of the novel but most of us thought it was slow getting started. We had an interesting discussion about having children later in life but most in our group are retired and were horrified to think of having a baby at our age. I can tell you not one of us was ready to go do research in the Amazon after reading this book! One lady in the group has been on a medical mission in the region and could shed some light on the native culture. She had not encountered cannibals, thank goodness!
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