Dr Annick Swenson had been financed by an American pharmaceutical society to go to remote part of the Amazon to do some research work on the drugs which could replicate the fertility of a local tribe, the Lakashi, whose women folk were able to have children even in their seventies. She was now 73, had been there for five years and had hated being distracted from her work by letters from the company asking about her progress, and had not replied to them. The company had then sent out Dr Anders Elkman to find her and bring her back. But after a time it received a brief letter from Swenson saying that Anders had died of a fever and had been buried locally.
Now the company sent out 42 year old Dr Marina Singh, a former pupil of Swenson’s and friend of Anders to establish contact with Swenson and to find out more about Anders’ death. What happens during this mission makes up the bulk of the book, which is intricately plotted, wonderfully written, and in which dramatic incidents follow close on one another.
There is first of all the compelling way in which Patchett describes the Amazon jungle and the innumerable dangers from insects, snakes, poisonous frogs etc.
Then there is the description of Lakashi tribe, of their so unfamiliar behaviour and customs, and the habit of its women to go to a particular place in the jungle to chew the bark from the trees there, which was the cause of their prolonged fertility and which, incidentally but importantly, prevented them from catching malaria.
Dr Swenson is the most impressive and fully realized character in the book. She was commanding personality whose gestures the Lakashi instantly obeyed. Although she initially resented the appearance of Marina, she was actually not as remote as one might have thought, told Marina at length about her experiences with the tribe, and in due course liked and respected her, and entrusted her with some quite remarkable responsibilities. Nor was she a solitary a worker: she was surrounded by a group of other doctors. But it also turns out that, on two important matters, she had deliberately lied, and these result in the dramatic ending of the book.
She had also more or less adopted Easter a young deaf boy from another tribe. He was very agile and intelligent boy; he skilfully piloted the pontoon boat on which they travelled and memorized all the creeks and inlets of the river system. He also easily formed bonds: with Dr Swenson, with Marina, and he had formed one with Anders while Anders was with the Lakashi.
It also turns out that, on two important matters, Dr Swenson had deliberately lied, and these result in the dramatic ending of the book.
There are a few drawbacks: the novel ends without telling us what happened to Dr Swenson when Marina eventually returned to America; and I found one or two crucial events hard to explain – notably what had made Marina agree to go to the Amazon in the first place, and why she had agreed to the company’s request that she should stay when she had decided to leave. But these cavils do not stop me from giving this remarkably inventive and unputdownable novel a five star rating.
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