IN+3+Amazonia

Amazonia James Rollins

__** October 21, 2011 **__ // The novel opens on July 25, in Amazonas, Brazil, which seems to be the entire area surrounding the Amazon River based on the maps I've seen. The first image is a man stumbling from the jungle, emaciated and wounded. When he tries to speak, blood comes from his mouth. He is tattooed in blues and reds on his chest, the center of which is a blue hand with red spiraling away from it. The man encounters a padre, or missionary, who tries to help him even though the local tribesmen warn him that the man has been "touched by demons" from the jungle. They call the tribe the Ban-ali tribe, or Blood Jaguars. //

// As the padre ministers to the man's wounds and his soul, he realizes the man's tongue has been cut out. He worries briefly if the local tribesmen were right, but quickly dismisses the "superstitious nonsense." As the man lying on the bed is in the throes of death, he fervently points to his pants. When the padre finally gives them to him, the man indicates the inseam. When the padre searches the pants, he discovers a bronze coin with the following engraved: Gerald Wallace Clark, United States Special Forces. //

// I really like Rollins' use of imagery. This is the tenth or eleventh book I've read by him, and he never disappoints. The first page usually opens with something super intriguing so I am unable to put the book down. This is no exception. A Special Forces soldier stumbling out of the jungle in that state?! Oh, I am hooked! I can't wait to keep reading!! //

__ period 2 __ // The second half of the prologue is set in Langley, Virginia, home of the FBI and CIA. The Deputy Director of the CIA has been called to the office of the director of the DEC, which I learned is the Directorate Environmental Center regarding the discovery of Agent Clark. O'Brien, a staunch follower of right and wrong and the head of the DEC, tells Fielding (CIA) that Clark went undercover to Brazil years ago to investigate gold mining and possible drug trafficking with a man named Dr. Carl Rand, only to disappear abruptly and seemingly without a trace. That was four years before he stumbled out of the jungle. When Fielding seems to be less-than-impressed with this detail, O'Brien shows him two pictures - one before he left and one from the morgue. In the picture before he left, Clark only had one arm as he had lost the other in combat two years before leaving for the mission. In the picture from the morgue, both arms were intact. //

//CREEEPY!!!!! I ABSOLUTELY LOVE WHEN ROLLINS DOES STUFF LIKE THIS!!!!!!!// // Rollins sets up this novel into Acts, so Act One is called The Mission, and on the title page, he has the name and picture of a plant (curare) with descriptions of what it does. Curious - I am thinking that since Agent Clark had an arm restored to him, there must be some sort of medicinal plant that regenerates human bone or flesh or something of the like... //

// Chapter one of act one introduces Nathan Rand, son of Carl who disappeared with Agent Clark, and a researcher in the Amazon. He is living with the Yanomamo tribe and studying their use of plants in medicine. While gathering some plants, he hears the screams of one of the tribal children, who is being pulled into the Amazon river by an anaconda ( CREEPY !!!). He risks life and limb to save her, only to have his actions misread when one of the adult tribeswomen stumbles upon him as he gives her mouth-to-mouth... and this is where I left off... still can't wait to read more!!! //

__ Period 3 __ // After Nathan resuscitates the girl, he realizes she is feverish and needs true medical attention. As the local hospital is ten miles away, he has to face the tribe in order to get there. They wait for him, arrows drawn and pointed. In an effort to save the girl and himself, he demands trial by combat. //

// The section ends at this point, so I am curious as to what that means. Will weapons be permitted? Or is it hand-to-hand? Why does he think he can win? Or perhaps trial by combat is one against one, and he realizes that he would never be able to get by all of them so combat is the only possibility... //

// I managed to get some time to read this week, so I need to do a bit of catch-up: //
 * October 28, 2011 **

// The trial by combat was comprised by the girl's father, armed with a blade of some sort, against Nathan, sans weapon. Just before the father is about to kill him, the girl awakes and tells the story, so he is forgiven and permitted to take her to the hospital. While at the hospital, a Western doctor by the name of Kelly O'Brien misdiagnoses the girl with epilepsy and administers drugs that actually cause her state to deteriorate. A local shaman who has also gone to Oxford to study medicine comes to find Nathan and happens on the situation. He immediately recognizes electric eel disease and treats the girl with a locally grown plant. I adore how Rollins illustrates the subconscious arrogance Westerners have to assume that herbal remedies are meaningless. Especially given that we get most of our manufactured medicines from the properties of plants. //

// The local shaman, professor Kouwe, tells Nathan that the U.S. Army has come with representatives from Tellux, the pharmaceutical company who sponsored Dr. Rand, Sr.'s expedition, to search the last steps of Gerald Clark to figure out where he's been for four years, possibly find the remaining team members, if any, and figure out what caused his arm to regenerate. Joined by Dr. Kelly O’Brien, her brother in the military, Frank, Robert Zane from Tellux, and his buddy Manny, head of the local Brazilian Indian foundation office, Nathan heads to the village where Gerald Clark stumbled from the jungle. //

// When they arrive, the village is on fire because the local shaman blamed the padre’s treatment of Gerald Clark for causing fevers of several small children. In order to banish the bad spirits, the shaman lit the hut on fire after two children died. Sadly, the remaining sick children were inside the hut and died. The expedition helped quench the fire before setting off on the trail of Clark, including a young adult jaguar rescued by Manny. //

// After trekking for half a day, the expedition finds Clark’s boat and decides to make camp while waiting for the helicopter to air-life boats for them to continue. Around the fire, they begin to debate deforestation, which is a pretty big debate among environmentalists today: the ability of the forest to rejuvenate versus how quickly we (the human race) consume it and what the implications are globally. Nathan argues that too many species, flora and fauna as well as Indian tribes, are becoming extinct because of it. When Zane argues that its negligible, Nathan points out that if deforestation had been escalated, we could very well have never found the Madagascan periwinkle plant, a plant from which doctors have pulled properties that generate two leading cancer drugs. //

// Back in the lab in Virginia, Lauren O’Brien is studying cells from Clark’s body, which is riddled with every variety of cancer - his tongue hadn’t been cut out; it had rotted out from cancer!!! According to the histology (reports on the types of cells), the cancer had metastasized quickly (3 months) and was identified as Teratocarcinomas. If I am inferring correctly, that means malignant tumors that form their own muscle, hair, teeth, bone, and nerves and attack embryonic stem cells, the cells that can mature into any bodily tissue. During the autopsy, they find a tumor in Clark’s body that flinches when it’s touched - CREEEEEEEEEEEPY! //

// Back in the jungle, Rollins describes an Indian tracker in the forest, painted blues and blacks to blend into the shadows who is following and watching the expedition as they camp for the night. The next day, the expedition comes across a caiman while traveling up the river. When the last boat passes it, it darts into the water, more than likely running out of fear. However, the military men panic and begin shooting, which provokes it to attack the boat. One of the men falls off the boat, and despite Nathan’s best efforts to warn him to play dead, he thrashes about and is eventually pulled under. //

// A somber group camps for the night, but not before Professor Kouwe pulls Nathan aside to tell him he suspects they are being tracked. He advises they wait a couple of days to wait to see if the Indians want to approach them rather be forced to do so. He also intimates that it may not be Indians as Indians are taught to be practically invisible when tracking. He finds it disconcerting that they have left such obvious clues as plants that have been picked clean of their fruit. //

__** November 10, 2011 **__ //While the group is sleeping for the night, two sentries are split up; one is shot in the neck with what seems to be a poison dart and is then taken by a female. The imagery Rollins uses to describe her makes her seem other worldly - as though she glows. It reminds me of the aura around the characters in the movie Avatar. When the camp discovers he's been taken, they assume that another caiman has attacked and dragged the soldier into the water.//

//Meanwhile, back in Langley, it has been discovered that wherever the body of Gerald Clark passed, in various ports along the Amazon and even in its entry port in the U.S., there has been an outbreak of a highly contagious and deadly disease among the children and elderly.//

__ ** November 18, 2011 ** __ //There is a mercenary team tracking the group, lead by Louis Favre. Having captured the soldier and made it look as though he had been taken to the river by a caiman, they tortured him (I will let you read those gory details for yourself - suffice it to say it made my stomach turn a bit) to get information about the munitions the expedition is carrying (napalm).//

//A thought provoking line from this section: "What hurt more...the torture? Or the actual moment you finally broke?"// //Rollins starts Act Three (he calls his chapters acts) with the description of the Brazil Nut. So far, he's used curare (Act One) and periwinkle (Act Two). I am going to have to go back once I finish the book to see why he used each plant for each section.//

//Two replacement Rangers have been flown in for those who were killed/taken, and the expedition has now travelled 400 miles+. They will no longer be receiving shipments because the helicopters are out of range, which, coupled with the mercenary team's presence, foreshadows conflict and trouble for the group.//

//Favorite line: "The jungle wept around them." GREAT personification to create the mood.//