State of Wonder Summary
State of Wonder is a novel about Dr. Marina Singh, a pharmacologist who travels to the Amazon to report on Dr. Annick Swenson's research and investigate Dr. Anders Eckman's death.
- Marina accompanies Dr. Swenson to her research station, where Dr. Swenson lives and works among the Lakashi people and has developed a new fertility drug.
- Marina grows close to Easter, a boy from the Hummoccan tribe. She learns that Dr. Swenson has secretly been developing a new anti-malarial drug and that Anders may still be alive.
- After locating Anders among the Hummoccans, Marina brings Anders back with her but leaves Easter behind.
Summary
Mr. Fox, the CEO of Vogel Pharmaceutical Company, brings Dr. Marina Singh, an Indian American pharmacologist, a letter announcing the death of her colleague Dr. Anders Eckman. The author of the letter is Dr. Annick Swenson, a researcher for Vogel based in Manaus, Brazil. Dr. Swenson provides few details about the circumstances of Anders’s death, explaining only that he has died from a fever and been buried in the Amazon somewhere near her research station.
Several months earlier, Anders had traveled to the Amazon rainforest in order to locate Dr. Swenson and obtain a report from her regarding the development of a revolutionary new fertility drug. After Marina and Mr. Fox deliver the news to Karen Eckman, Anders’s wife, Karen calls Marina to tell her that she believes Anders might still be alive. Both Karen and Mr. Fox, with whom Marina is having a secret relationship, put pressure on Marina to travel to Manaus in order to learn more about what happened to Anders and complete Anders’s work assignment.
Marina is reluctant to travel, but she agrees to make the trip and prepares by taking Lariam, an anti-malarial drug that she knows will cause her to experience nightmares. She starts taking the anti-malarials before her flight to Manaus, and when the nightmares begin, they are similar to the nightmares she experiences as a child. Throughout her childhood, Marina took Lariam whenever she and her mother traveled to India to visit Marina’s father; her memories of her father intermingled with the images of him that appeared in her nightmares, causing her anguish even now as an adult.
When Marina arrives in Manaus, her luggage is lost. Among her lost possessions is a special phone from Mr. Fox with the capability to make calls and send email from anywhere in the world. A driver named Milton meets Marina at the airport. He brings her to his brother-in-law Roderigo’s general store so she can buy some basic supplies and clothing. Marina learns from Milton that though Dr. Swenson has an address in Manaus, she spends most of her time at her research station in the jungle. A young Australian couple named Barbara and Jackie Bovender live in Dr. Swenson’s apartment in Manaus, protecting Dr. Swenson’s privacy by blocking anyone who comes to town in search of her. When the Bovenders refuse to give Marina any information about Dr. Swenson’s whereabouts, Marina retreats in frustration to her hotel, where she falls ill with a fever. Barbara brings her a shaman’s cure, which Marina takes. The potion makes her violently ill, but it also breaks the fever, and Marina’s health is restored.
When Marina is well again, she accompanies the Bovenders to the opera in Manaus. There, they encounter Dr. Swenson and a young Hummoccan boy named Easter. After the opera, Marina, Dr. Swenson, and Easter, who is deaf, go to dinner at a restaurant in Manaus and discuss the reasons behind Marina’s trip to Brazil. Dr. Swenson asserts that Marina is not welcome to join her at the research station in the jungle, but the next morning, Marina appears at Roderigo’s general store, where Dr. Swenson is buying supplies. Marina invites herself along to the Amazon so that she can collect Anders’s belongings. Milton drives Marina and Easter to the dock, where they meet Dr. Swenson and board the pontoon boat; Easter captains the boat and expertly navigates the Río Negro.
As they travel down the river, Marina and Dr. Swenson talk, and Dr. Swenson explains that fifty years prior, she was first introduced to the Amazon and the Lakashi tribe as a student...
(This entire section contains 1390 words.)
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of Dr. Martin Rapp. When they arrive at their destination, Easter guides the boat to the dock attached to the shore, and they are welcomed by the Lakashi. Marina is led to a cot in a covered shelter, where she will sleep next to Easter, whose hammock dangles across the room from her cot.
Marina soon meets the other researchers: Thomas Nkomo, a Senegalese doctor researching malaria; Dr. Budi, an Indonesian researcher studying fertility; and Dr. Alan Saturn and his wife, Dr. Nancy Saturn, who are American ethnobotanists. As Marina adjusts to her new surroundings in the Amazon, she notices that some of the pregnant Lakashi women appear to be in their sixties and seventies. Marina learns about the research taking place and is soon put to work in the research station that Dr. Swenson and her team have set up in the jungle.
Shortly after Marina’s arrival at the research station, she has a series of dramatic experiences. She witnesses a Lakashi named Benoit and the boy Easter wrestle an anaconda, she delivers a Lakashi baby by Caesarean section, and she discovers that Dr. Swenson, who is seventy-three, is six months pregnant. Dr. Swenson insists that Marina stay in the Amazon to deliver Dr. Swenson’s baby when it is time, which triggers a crisis of confidence in Marina. In addition, Marina learns that the women of the Lakashi bite and chew the bark of a certain tree, and ingesting this bark enables them to have children well beyond the expected age of fertility. Dr. Swenson has formulated a fertility drug from this bark, the same drug that Mr. Fox and the Vogel shareholders desperately want, and her pregnancy at the age of seventy-three is the result of her self-experimentation.
With the help of a few Lakashi, Marina attempts to alert a boat traveling down the river, hoping to give the travelers on the boat a handful of letters to send to the United States from Manaus. To her surprise, the boat is carrying Milton, Barbara Bovender, and Mr. Fox. Marina feels awkward around Mr. Fox; the secret nature of their relationship and their lack of communication combine to create a strangeness between them. As well, Marina now knows that Dr. Swenson and her team are working on a secret project alongside the fertility drug, which is practically complete. Dr. Swenson has not told Mr. Fox the truth, because she needs Vogel resources to continue to develop an anti-malarial drug that will be less profitable to Vogel but will save millions of lives. Marina’s loyalty to Dr. Swenson conflicts with her loyalty to Mr. Fox, and she is relieved when he is persuaded to return to Manaus with Barbara and Milton the following morning.
Before Barbara leaves for Manaus, she tells Marina about a terrifying moment during their journey when she gave Milton the wrong directions. At this time, they unwittingly approached the territory belonging to the Hummoccans, who shot arrows at the boat as it came close to shore. Barbara is certain that she saw a vision of her dead father during this episode. Dr. Swenson tells Marina that she has not felt any fetal movements for at least a day, and she believes that her baby is dead. Marina must operate on Dr. Swenson the next day.
After Barbara, Milton, and Mr. Fox leave for Manaus, Marina delivers the baby by Caesarean section, and the baby is stillborn with a significant birth defect. Marina looks after Dr. Swenson as she recovers from the operation, and Dr. Swenson and Marina discuss Barbara’s hallucination of her dead father. Dr. Swenson reveals to Marina that she believes that Barbara’s vision was not a hallucination, but a glimpse of Dr. Anders Eckman. Dr. Swenson explains to Marina that Anders disappeared one night while he was delirious with fever. He never returned, which led Dr. Swenson to assume that he had died in the rainforest.
Marina and Easter travel by boat to find the Hummoccans and rescue Anders; Marina brings gifts of oranges and peanut butter. When they arrive, the Hummoccan tribesmen recognize Easter as one of their own, and Marina must swap the boy for Anders. Fleeing for their lives, Marina and Anders leave Easter, who is confused and terrified, with the Hummoccans. When Marina and Anders return to the research station, Dr. Swenson is appalled that they have left Easter behind.
That night Marina and Anders share a bed and make love, and the next morning, they travel back to Minnesota. They share a taxi from the airport, and Marina watches from the car window as Anders is reunited with his family.
