Patchett and Meyer were bemoaning the fact that they were spending too much time on the road and not enough time at the desk. In 2008, she and her husband were having dinner with Edgar Meyer, the acclaimed Nashville double bass player, and his wife. A conversation with friends changed all that. “When I finished Run, which was a book that took me for-bloody-ever, I didn’t have an idea for a book, and that’s really rare,” she says. Patchett points out that she wrote State of Wonder “much, much more quickly” than any of her five previous novels. Hoping to find clues about Anders’ death, Marina reluctantly sets out on a fact-finding mission that will alter the course of her life. The enigmatic and elusive Swenson, who has virtually disappeared while working on a potentially valuable new drug, does not, however, want to be found the last person sent to look for her, Marina’s research partner and friend Anders Eckman, died in the process. Marina Singh, a research scientist with a Minnesota pharmaceutical company dispatched to Brazil to track down her former mentor, Dr. Set deep in the heart of the Amazonian jungle, State of Wonder tells the story of Dr. This world of charming homes and coddled pets could not be farther from the exotic one Patchett conjures up in her latest and possibly finest novel to date, State of Wonder.Ī woman’s search for her mentor in the South American jungle leads to a shocking discovery. (Friend and fellow writer Donna Tartt, who has an ancient paraplegic pug, has been hugely supportive, offering empathy and advice on physical therapy.) “It makes me feel like an insane person, but I couldn’t do the stroller,” Patchett says with a laugh. The author admits to carrying the dog in a baby sling on walks since the terrier mix lost the use of her back legs. The first part of our conversation is taken up with talk of dogs Rose, Patchett’s great love and the subject of several essays, is now 15 years old. We recently made a call to Ann Patchett at her favorite spot on the globe-the handsome red brick house she shares with her husband on a tree-lined street in Nashville.

State of Wonder by Ann Patchett