Staff Pick
The People in the Trees has done a thorough job of rattling me to the core, and several months after reading it, I still can't stop thinking about it. The book has so many things I love: an unreliable narrator, explosive endings, secrets, unlikable characters, a scientific bent, cultural clashes, an arrogant hero, and ordinary life depicted realistically. This is a tough book to love, yet I do... and I don't. Rarely has a book had me so torn, but this one has, and in stereo. I want to beg everyone I know to read it, because I desperately need to talk through this amazing, crazy, bizarre story with someone. The last 75 pages are absolutely riveting; I could not put it down! Recommended By Dianah H., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
A
Chicago Tribune Noteworthy Book, a
Huffington Post Best Book, a
Cosmopolitan Best Book of 2013 (by Women), and a
Washington Post and
Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year
Readers of exciting, challenging and visionary literary fiction — including admirers of Norman Rush's Mating, Ann Patchett's State of Wonder, Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, and Peter Matthiessen's At Play in the Fields of the Lord — will be drawn to this astonishingly gripping and accomplished first novel. A decade in the writing, this is an anthropological adventure story that combines the visceral allure of a thriller with a profound and tragic vision of what happens when cultures collide. It is a book that instantly catapults Hanya Yanagihara into the company of young novelists who really, really matter.
In 1950, a young doctor called Norton Perina signs on with the anthropologist Paul Tallent for an expedition to the remote Micronesian island of Ivu'ivu in search of a rumored lost tribe. They succeed, finding not only that tribe but also a group of forest dwellers they dub "The Dreamers," who turn out to be fantastically long-lived but progressively more senile. Perina suspects the source of their longevity is a hard-to-find turtle; unable to resist the possibility of eternal life, he kills one and smuggles some meat back to the States. He scientifically proves his thesis, earning worldwide fame and the Nobel Prize, but he soon discovers that its miraculous property comes at a terrible price. As things quickly spiral out of his control, his own demons take hold, with devastating personal consequences.
Review
“The People in the Trees is a Nabokovian phantasmagoria, bound to raise serious, interesting, troubling questions. Hanya Yanagihara is a writer to watch." Madison Smartt Bell, author of The Color of Night and All Souls’ Rising
Review
“The People in the Trees is not a first novel like other first novels. This is a big, soaring, old-school, super-absorbing vehicle into another world. It’s a mystery story, an ecological parable, a monstrous confession, and a fascinating consideration of moral relativism. Yanagihara’s narrator is misanthropic and grotesque, yet simultaneously magnetic; her prose is dazzling; and her book is a triumph of the imagination." Anthony Doerr, author of Four Seasons in Rome and The Shell Collector
Review
“This is an engrossing, beautifully detailed, at times amazing (and shocking) novel, and right up my alley: a far-off and beautiful place in the Pacific, islanders living to their own drumbeat, earnest meddling outsiders, and a sticky outcome — the Fall, with a lot of science and passion behind it, and an impressive debut for Hanya Yanagihara. I loved this book.”Paul Theroux, author of The Lower River and The Great Railway Bazaar
Review
"One of the year's best books...Driven by Yanagihara's gorgeously complete imaginary ethnography on the one hand and, on the other, by her brilliantly detestable narrator, this debut novel is compelling on every level
Review
"[The People in the Trees] is exhaustingly inventive and almost defiant in its refusal to offer redemption or solace — but that is arguable one of its virtues. As for Yanagihara, she is a writer to marvel at."
The New York Times Book Review
Review
"Yanagihara presents a cautionary tale about what can happen when Western arrogance meets primeval culture."
Kirkus Reviews
Synopsis
A powerful work of visionary literary fiction from the bestselling author of the Man Booker Prize and National Book Award-nominated modern classic,
A Little Life.
It is 1950 when Norton Perina, a young doctor, embarks on an expedition to a remote Micronesian island in search of a rumored lost tribe. There he encounters a strange group of forest dwellers who appear to have attained a form of immortality that preserves the body but not the mind. Perina uncovers their secret and returns with it to America, where he soon finds great success. But his discovery has come at a terrible cost, not only for the islanders, but for Perina himself. Disquieting yet thrilling, The People in the Trees is an anthropological adventure story with a profound and tragic vision of what happens when cultures collide.
Synopsis
A thrilling anthropological adventure story with a profound and tragic vision of what happens when cultures collide,
from the bestselling author of the Man Booker Prize and National Book Award-nominated modern classic, A Little Life. "Enthralling . . . deeply entertaining." --San Francisco Chronicle
It is 1950 when Norton Perina, a young doctor, embarks on an expedition to a remote Micronesian island in search of a rumored lost tribe. There he encounters a strange group of forest dwellers who appear to have attained a form of immortality that preserves the body but not the mind. Perina uncovers their secret and returns with it to America, where he soon finds great success. But his discovery has come at a terrible cost, not only for the islanders, but for Perina himself.
About the Author
Hanya Yanagihara lives in New York.