Customer Reviews

Field Guide

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4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
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A fluid, beautiful book. The reader is instantly mesmerized by the author's sharp perception into humanity. Gross easily takes on large conflicts such as independence vs. dependence, freedom vs. obligation, and love vs. loss, and treats them with subtle insight and grace. The details are stunning and the characters have an unpredictable depth that twists and turns deliciously as the reader travels deeper into the rain forest. Readers will find themselves in Annabel Mendelssohn even if they've never been to the Australian rain forest to study bats! A wonderful combination of poetic prose and page-turning urgency. I couldn't stop thinking about it long after I finished. I'm so excited that I've discovered a new favorite author. An absorbing, rich read.

An unusual setting and an unlikely subject form the backdrop to this first novel by Gwendolen Gross. American, Annabel Mendelssohn, has come to the wilds of Australia to do graduate field work on her favorite subject, spectacled fruit bats. Despite uncomfortable conditions, it is a life's dream come true, as well as an escape from haunting memories of her beloved brother's death two years before; that is, until her strange professor, for whom she harbors a vague attraction, goes missing. Her research is further disrupted by anti-environmentalist loggers as well as the appearance of the professor's son, Leon Goode, newly arrived from his student and work stints in America. Eventually the two meet and go in search of the professor, along the way discovering their own mutual attraction and the similarity of family circumstances that invisibly bind them.

Interspersed with the Australian segments are glimpses of Leon's life in Boston and that of Annabel's sister's in Connecticut, flashbacks of memory, as well as E-mails and imaginary letters that travel between the two sisters, that contribute to our understanding of the characters' inner lives. These devices bring balance and the exotic Australian outback enlivens the plot to what might otherwise be a ho-hum story.

I always enjoy learning about nature, cultures, etc., but this novel seemed to end when it was just beginning. It left me flat. The author only touched on each subject she included rather that really delving into each of them. It seemed to me a great draft of what could have been a great story.

Field Guide draws the reader into a lush Australian rainforest setting to join the search for a professor who has "gone missing." The prose is radiant, exploring the themes of disappearance, loss and love, with sensitivity and intensity. An amazing book! I am eagerly awaiting Gross's next novel.

The story woven by Gwendolen Gross in Field Guide is extremely satisfying. Please, read other reviews and the book's summary to learn more about the story itself. It is the satisfaction of reading a book about a woman in science that most attracts me.

Annabel, the main character, is a woman of honor in the scientific field. Gross gives Annabel great field skills, courage, energy and dedication. I thoroughly enjoyed enduring the Australian forests, feeling the mistaken hand on a snake, smelling the bat guano...

Gross gives credibility to women in science, yet does not make them single-minded creatures of study. Annabel deals with the death of a family member that haunts her studies, attractions to others, and even some romance, yet she maintains herself as a reliable and steadfast scientist, too.

Brava!

My mother and I both loved Field Guide. She liked the human elements and the ending best. I enjoyed the beginning and appreciated most the author's description of nature and especially bats! That was the best surprise for me.

This is a cerebrally-rich novel delving into the mindset of a young female grad student researching spectacled fruit bats in Australia. For those interesting in detailed experiences slogging it out in the outbush, you may be disappointed. A minimum of scientific data presents in the story content, and even less of the bountiful data of the Australian outback. Instead, this novel appears to focus on the feelings of a young woman coming to grips of the mysterious death of an older brother, missing her older sister, coping with prissy room mate grad students and managing her lust for her intriguing professor, John Goode.

In the course of all this mind slush, is the curve ball. John Goode, the typical absent minded type professor goes missing. This is nothing unusual for him, he is quirky, often takes off for over-lingering research jaunts and is also suffering remorse as a result of an affair recently committed which has decimated his family.

The elder son, Leon travels back home to Australia from America to search for his father. In the course of the investigation, he meets Annabel, a name he was given that could shed some light on his father's disappearance. The inevitable attraction occurs while the search for answers continues. The formula for a ripping novel was there, but it just didn't get off the guano.

Perhaps Annabel Mendelssohn was escaping the death of her older brother in a diving accident or suicide two years ago. Whatever the real reason is the Connecticut Yankee travels to James Cook University in Australia to do graduate fieldwork. Her subject is the behavioral patterns of spectacle fruit bats. Her only link home is e-mail with her sister.

Though mostly alone in the Rain Forest with her bats, Annabel finds herself attracted to the fiftyish professor John Goode even with hunks her own age nearby. When John suddenly vanishes, Annabel becomes concerned for him. John's son Leon arrives from Boston in search of his missing father. When Leon and Annabel meet, negative electrons fly as each irritates the other. However, those negative electrons soon attract one another as they join forces in seeking John.

FIELD GUIDE is a warm relationship drama that centers on science and family without losing a step in either forum. The story line is understated, which adds to the feel of being in the rain forest with Annabel who reflects on her own family woes. The ending is obvious, but no one will care because the plot is so well written and Annabel is quite the complete character who insures that the tale works. Gwendolen Gross guides her audience with this first rate story.

Harriet Klausner