State of Wonder

 by Ann Patchett

This is the second book I have read by this author.  The first book I read, Bel Canto, is one of my favourite books.

This book is about a woman researcher who is sent into the Amazonian jungle to find out 1)why/how one of her colleagues who was sent down died 2)how the research is going to find a product to extend women's fertility later in life.

The woman arrives in a city and eventually makes contact with people who are looking after the apartment of the Head Researcher.  They won't take her to see the researcher and say they don't know when the woman will come back to town for supplies.

Eventually the researcher does show up and the other researcher insists on going back into the jungle with her.  The pilot on their boat is a native boy, about 6 years of age, who is deaf.

The women and boy arrive at the spot where the Lakshmi live.  The second researcher's luggage disappears and she is eventully coaxed out of her last clothing and put in a dress the local women wear.  She is introduced to the trees that the local women visit in the forest.  The women chew the bark.  It is thought that chewing the tree keeps the women fertile and also prevents malaria. The head researcher is wanting to work on the fertility discovery but she also wants to pursue a cure for malaria, something she knows her company won't be interested in so she keeps stalling with her researcher.  There may be some kind of connection between the trees, mushrooms that grow at the base of tress and a moth that is attracted to the bark where women have chewed.

The second researcher is shocked to learn that the Main Researcher, her former mentor, is pregnant at 73 years of age.  The researcher is shocked at what her mentor has done and eventually has to perform a c-section on her boss to remove her deformed fetus which has died (the fetus had a mermaid tail rather than legs).  While there the researcher does a c-section on another woman, saves the deaf boy from an anaconda so she has a lot of status in the community.

Eventually she figures out that her co-worker is not dead but is at another village of cannibals.  She and the deaf boy go to rescue him.  The only way she can rescue her co-worker is to give up the boy to the cannibals.  The Mentor is furious with her for having done this.  

The woman and her co-worker return to the U.S. in the next couple days.

This was an interesting story with lots to think about.  One review I read said the book is not as good as some of her other works but I really enjoyed it.