A New
York Times Bestseller; Orange Prize nominee; a Time Magazine's Best Books of the Year; a Publisher's Weekly's Best Top Ten Best Books; and a Wellcome Trust Book
Prize nominee.
"Expect miracles when you read Ann Patchett's fiction."--New
York Times Book Review
Award-winning, New York Times bestselling
author Ann Patchett returns with a provocative and assured novel of morality
and miracles, science and sacrifice set in the Amazon rainforest.
Marina Singh is a research scientist at Vogel,
a pharmaceutical institute in Minnesota, and inconveniently in love with her
boss, Mr. Fox. When one of her colleagues is reported to have died while
following up on the progress of a field team based in Brazil, Marina is
dispatched by Mr. Fox to the Amazon to uncover the truth of his death. And
his widow wants his effects. She travels to Manaus, then down into the
Amazonian delta, deep into the dense, dark, insect-infested jungle. The
research team is looking into the development of a new miracle drug that
could revolutionize Western society. A local tribe has the bark of a certain
tree, it yields a substance which allows them to conceive late into middle
age: many of the women are getting pregnant into their sixties and seventies.
The problem is that the team is taking too long: they have been silent for
two years, and Marina has been tasked to find out what is holding back their
progress. The second problem is more serious: the team is being headed up by
the daunting figure of Annick Swenson, an eminent and fiercely uncompromising
scientist who was once Marina's colleague, and towards whom Marina has very
complicated feelings. What Marina learns will change her life. In a novel
that is packed with amazing twists and surprises, Ann Patchett returns with
immense confidence to a broad canvas, teeming with atmosphere and characters
and rich with narrative. Remarkable events--fights with anacondas;
encounters with cannibals; deaths; re-births--and profound moral decisions
come together in a novel that will enthrall her many readers and fans and is
guaranteed to be a major bestseller.
Infusing the narrative with the
same ingenuity and emotional urgency that pervaded her acclaimed previous
novels Bel Canto, Taft, Run, The
Magician's Assistant, and The Patron Saint of Liars, Patchett
delivers an enthralling, innovative tale of aspiration, exploration, and
attachment in State of Wonder--a gripping adventure story and a
profound look at the difficult choices we make in the name of discovery and
love.
