Description: Joining an anthropologist's 1950 expedition to discover a lost tribe on a remote Micronesian island, a young doctor investigates and proves a theory that the tribe's considerable longevity is linked to a rare turtle, a finding that brings worldwide fame and unexpected consequence.
Review Quotes: One of the Best Books of the Year: Chicago Tribune - San Francisco Chronicle - The Wall Street Journal - Publishers Weekly - Huffington Post - Cosmopolitan
"Exhaustingly inventive and almost defiant in its refusal to offer redemption or solace. . . . As for Yanagihara, she is a writer to marvel at." --The New York Times Book Review "A mystery story, an ecological parable, a monstrous confession, and a fascinating consideration of moral relativism. . . . A triumph of the imagination." --Anthony Doerr, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of All the Light We Cannot See "Haunting. . . . A standout novel . . . thrilling." --The Wall Street Journal "Fascinating and multilayered. . . . [Yanagihara's] storytelling is masterful. . . . Hugely ambitious and entertaining." --The Boston Globe"A deeply satisfying adventure story. . . . Provokes discussions about science, morality and our obsession with youth." --Chicago Tribune
"Hauntingly strange and utterly convincing. . . . A novel you will finish and immediately want to read again; a complex, elegant and wonderfully troubling debut." --Sarah Waters, author of Tipping the Velvet "Feels like a National Geographic story by way of Conrad's Heart of Darkness. . . . The world Yanagihara conjures up, full of 'dark pockets of mystery, ' is magical." --The Times (London) "An engrossing, beautifully detailed, at times amazing (and shocking) novel." --Paul Theroux, author of The Lower River and The Great Railway Bazaar
"By turns brilliant, provocative and profoundly sobering." --Independent on Sunday (London) "Captivating--and thoroughly unsettling." --Vogue
"Impossible to resist. . . . Packed with a symphony of complex themes made accessible by the sheer poetry of [Yanagihara's] prose. . . . [A] brilliantly told story." --The Daily Mail (London) "A Nabokovian phantasmagoria. . . . Hanya Yanagihara is a writer to watch." --Madison Smartt Bell, author of The Color of Night and All Souls' Rising
"Engrossing." --Minneapolis Star Tribune "Richly imagined. . . . Striking and highly satisfying." --The Guardian (London) "Astonishing. . . . Riveting." --Interview magazine "Pulses with big ideas. . . . Masterful. . . . [An] audacious, beautifully wrought tragedy." --The Toronto Star