Review
"A brilliant novel . . . A vision of wonder."--"The Boston Globe"
"Fascinating . . . In the end we see what Powers, with his beautiful language and broad reach, always wishes to have us see: the eternal mystery of human personality and how it functions in the extreme drama of the modern world."--"O, The Oprah Magazine"
"A kind of neuro-cosmological adventure . . . an exhilarating narrative feat . . . Powers is a formidable talent, and this is a lucid, fiercely entertaining novel."--"The Washington Post Book World"
"A wise and elegant post-9/11 novel . . . The mysteries unfold so organically and stealthily that you are unaware of his machinations until they come to stunning fruition. . . . Powers accomplishes something magnificent."--Colson Whitehead, "The New York Times Book Review"
"Powers may well be one of the smartest novelists now writing. . . . In "The Echo Maker, " Powers hopes to plumb the nature of consciousness, and he does so with such alert passion that we come to recognize in his quest the novel's abiding theme--What it means to be human will forever elude us."--"Los Angeles Times Book Review"
"One of the year's most engrossing."--"Entertainment Weekly"
"[Powers's] characters are unforgettable, flesh-and-blood individuals as finely drawn as those of any contemporary fiction writer."--Steve Weinberg, "The Seattle Times" --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
The Sunday Telegraph
The Guardian Review
Book Description
Product Description
From the Publisher
From the Back Cover
On a winter night on a remote road in Nebraska, twenty-seven-year-old Mark Schluter's truck turns over in a near-fatal accident. His older sister, Karin, returns reluctantly to their hometown to nurse Mark back from a traumatic head injury. But when he emerges from a protracted coma, Mark believes that this woman - who he realises looks, acts, and sounds just like his sister - is really an identical impostor.
Shattered by her brother's refusal - or inability - to recognise her, Karin contacts the cognitive neurologist Gerald Weber, famous for his case studies describing the almost infinitely bizarre worlds of brain disorder. Weber recognises Mark as a very unusual case of Capgras Syndrome and is keen to investigate. But what he discovers in Mark begins to undermine even his own sense of self. Meanwhile, Mark, armed only with a note left by an anonymous witness, attempts to learn what happened on the night of his accident. The truth of that evening will change the lives of all three beyond recognition.
Richard Powers' new book is a profound and riveting novel that explores how memory, instinct and relationships make us who we are. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.