The Echo Maker

The Echo Maker is another great book by one of the best, smartest authors writing today. Powers explores what it means to be human, to have a self, through the lens of neurology. If there is any fault in this book, it is that Powers can become too technical as he delves into the discoveries that brain researchers have made in the last quarter century. Nevertheless, the mystery surrounding a character who comes away from an auto accident with the rare disease, Capgras syndrome, drives the plot and the exploration of the central characters who are affected by his accident. The vision that Powers leaves us with is not one of the transcendence of humanity, but rather of the tenuous connection we have to our planet, to each other, and even show more to ourselves. show less

I knew nothing about The Echo Maker going in, save what I'd read on the back cover: near-fatal car accident...traumatic head injury...coma...Mark emerges and believes his sister is an imposter...famous cognitive neurologist diagnoses him with some sort of syndrome...mysterious disease combined with strange circumstances surrounding the accident threaten to change all of their lives beyond recognition. Wow, sounds like a soap opera, a cheap thriller at best. And yet the "National Book Award Winner" stamp on the front cover suggested the exact opposite.

I normally avoid much (if not all) forewarning and inside information about a book before I start reading, but this time I googled/searched for some reviews, quickly found Margaret Atwood's show more glowing/gushing review in the NY Review of Books, skimmed the first few paragraphs, got to some claptrap comparing this novel to The Wizard of Oz, figured it would be best to just dive in, and so I dove in.

I'm often amazed (amused?) at how expectations going into reading a novel can unrealistically set a tone to the benefit/detriment of the reader. E.g., the last book you read by an author sets your expectation for the next one, which you assume will be of a similar vein, and if it is/isn't you are pleased/disappointed, depending on what you were anticipating. (See my disappointment around The Prague Cemetery.) Similarly, the "blurb" on the back of the book may help sell more copies, if worded in such a way to make a potential reader think he is picking up a quick thriller, if such a reader is looking for a quick thriller, but the book will ultimately be a disappointment when he figures out it is, in fact, a slow psychological drama that unfolds at a painstakingly deliberate pace. I, on the other hand, was simply reading this book based on a recommendation and would otherwise have avoided it based on the "cheap thriller" denouncement via the back blurb and was therefore pleasantly surprised that what I got, instead, was a brilliantly crafted psychological puzzle laid out in pieces, one page at a time, until they all merged together to create an entire picture at the book's end.

Not much of a review so far, I realize, rather an explanation of how I got here, to this point, where I, too, am thinking of writing my own glowing/gushing praises for this book. But I think I won't. I've gone back and read what Atwood said, and she sums it up pretty nicely (except for the Oz stuff, which is still under jury deliberation in my own mind). Instead, let me share a few of my thoughts randomly:

1. Some novelists are great writers (i.e., they can string together an impressive set of words) while others are great story-tellers (i.e., this one should be self explanatory) but Richard Powers is* a rare blend of both. If you're looking for a novel that is pure lyrical poetry, go check out Proust. If you're looking for purely plot driven novel, you probably already know which section of the bookstore you should be shopping in. But, if you're like me, and constantly on the lookout for a complimentary blend of both worlds, here is a great example.

* I say "is" based on this one book, which I acknowledge could technically be a one-off, but let's trust (for now) that the National Book Foundation wouldn't award Powers their highest honor if his preceding catalog read like the mindless blather of a madman.

2. That said, and know how difficult it is to find such a blend, I'm very happy to see the National Book Foundation recognizing this effort, this talent.

3. If you read this, be aware of tense shifts across different POV's. This is not so much important to the story as it is a clever way to distinguish differences in states of mind. As a literary device, I've seen this before, but in Powers' hands and in the framework of this story, I'm not sure I've ever seen it better utilized.

4. To the naysayers who suggest this novel could have been trimmed back, especially in the technical/scientific/medical discussions around various brain injuries/illnesses and their subsequent effects on those suffering from them, I think you missed the point. This story is told from three main character's POV's, alternating, and each three sees things from his/her own perspective. So ask yourself this: if you were a "famous cognitive neurologist" who writes books about the various test subjects you've encountered over the years, wouldn't those be the ruby-colored lenses through which you see the entire world? And if your own world view was crumbling around you, wouldn't those lenses get darker and darker?

5. And how brilliant was it when Weber inserts himself into his own ongoing litanies of case studies at the end of the novel?

Wow, I cannot say enough good things about this book, so instead I will just warn those who are looking for a cheap/quick thriller: this isn't. But if you're looking for something else, something well written, something rewarding, especially if you like to think about what you're reading while you're reading it and make it all the way to the end and then keep thinking about it for a while longer before you drop your final judgement: this is. show less

The most remarkable thing about this complex, satisfying, hopeful but for the right reasons story is the way that themes move through the portions by each narrator in migration patters mimicking that of the sandhill cranes passing through the landscape in which the story takes place. Responsibility for family versus personal desires and attractions, identity conflicts versus volition, ecology versus development, public identity versus private - the novel can be read, enjoyably, along each of these lines or simply as a story about family, its habits and its loves - all circle, all converge, all relate to the circumstances of tragedy (car accident, water supply deficits, the September 11 attacks) but all, in the end, come back to love.

I'm show more still unpacking all the many aspects of the novel, but I'm trying to think of each one in terms of the title. It's such a strange phrase: Echo Maker. Not sound maker, not music maker, not noise maker, not maker of something others can see or echo of something in particular. Why Echo Maker? I can't tell you the most obvious reason without spoiling the thread of mystery that begins with a note found in a hospital room, but I can tell you that, as the responsible yet unconfident sister, the head-injured brother, the neurologist observing him, and the cranes themselves narrate portions of the story, each is trying not so much to make a sound as to create an answer. The sister wants affirmation, the brother an answer to what has happened and why things seem off, wrong somehow; the neurologist wants his work to be understood for what it is rather than strictly as science or strictly as publishable narratives, and the cranes, most mysterious of all, seek the memory of places as they flow from north to south and back again, echoes left by genetics and behavior over thousands of years. It's a powerful image, the Echo Maker, and it circles through each narrative in migration patterns of its own.

In the end, the story shows us that all life, all mind, is echo making. Identity itself is little more than the received impression we interpret after acting, communicating, thinking, and doing over a lifetime. And yet, identity is no small thing; it is a beautiful thing; it is the thing we can best create, and the thing we must strive to create. It may seem hopeless. The cranes don't understand that the stress they feel, cramming themselves into what little space humans have left them, will eventually hurt their whole species, just as humans, specifically in this story and generally in the world, seldom see the entire interconnected picture of causes and effects, habits and leaps. But in the end, the cranes will adapt, or something will, and in the end so will we, somehow overcoming the stress that causes us to commit horrors in the world quickly or slowly, somehow adapting to the asynchronous, discontinuous facts of our neurology and our quotidian existence, somehow creating a pattern that has meaning and beauty.

The echoes this book has left with me haunt me, like strains from an intricate symphony still recalled, still elaborated, still reverberating. I can't imagine a reader passing through this book unchanged - or uninspired. show less

Near the site of the annual migration of half a million sandhill cranes to the Platte River in Kearney, Nebraska, Mark Schluter is almost killed in a truck accident on a late wintery night. His brain injury results in Capgras Delusion, a real and rare syndrome also called The Illusion of Doubles, which causes him to believe that those close to him have been replaced by identical looking imposters. Mark's sister Karin (whom Mark calls Karin II) returns to Kearney to care for him, and she also summons a famous Oliver-Sacks-like doctor, Gerald Weber, to aid in treatment. Karin reconnects with old lovers: Daniel who works on sandhill crane preservation, and Robert, a developer who has his eye on migratory territory. Meanwhile, all show more characters seem fascinated with Barbara Gillespie, one of Mark's caretakers whom nobody can figure out. Capgras serves Powers as a metaphor for the inability to know others, or even know ourselves. Karin even feels the whole human race suffers from Capgras in our inability to recognize other species as our next of kin. If we did, would we be so cavalier in our disregard for them?

The protagonists are constantly agonizing: who am I really? who is that other person? Mark, injured into honesty, is the only one who tells it like it is: you and you and you are no one but imposters. The self, Powers writes, is an ongoing composition made from chemical media: glutamate, magnesium, calcium constantly making adjustments to the picture. [Joan Didion, "On Keeping a Notebook," : "I have already lost touch with a couple of people I used to be."]

The characters in "The Echo Maker" have some similarities to those in "The Gold Bug Variations": they refer to each other as "woman" or "man"; names are familiarized in the same ways: Mark becomes Marker, just as Frank became Franker in "Gold Bug." The women are generally on the attack, and the men blithely unaware. A younger couple's relationship is "echoed" and intwined with an older couple's.

The differences from "Gold Bug" are heartbreaking. Whereas "Gold Bug" was an elaborate, even breathtaking fugue of intellectual ebulliance, "The Echo Maker" seems more like "Richard Powers For Dummies." The characters are mostly concerned with their own weaknesses and failures. Elevated prose is in short supply. Yet a plot centered on the brain is rife with possibilities. One thinks wistfully of Powers' exploration of conscious thought explored in "Galatea 2.2," or the paean to emergence in "Gold Bug."

Although "The Echo Maker" won The National Book Award, I was disappointed with this book. I wondered if Powers were feeling affinity with his character Gerald Weber, who worries incessantly about being past his greatest work and "on the back nine" so to speak. But perhaps one expects more of Richard Powers than of other writers. (JAF) show less

In "The Echo Maker" Richard Powers gives us an encylopedic recap of neurological pathologies, and a fraught scientific debate about the current state of neurology.

This book portrays accident victim Mark Schluter and his grappling with Capgras Syndrome, the inability to recognize one's loved ones - and the resulting assumption that persons close to you are impostors. Gerald Weber, MD, the cognitive neurologist and popular author, takes time out from his busy book-promotion tour to visit, but why? Is it merely to exploit Mark for his new book? Or does this unique case present a scientific opportunity to further research the illness? Or maybe it's because he finds Mark's sister Karin's pleading for help too appealing to turn down. Whatever show more the reason, Dr. Weber's visit coincides with a precipitous drop in his popular reputation, and a frightening downward slide in which he begins to diagnose numerous neuropathologies in himself.

Powers's gift lies in his erudition. He succeeds in personalizing quite a bit of current neurology for the reader, but his narrative thread frays at the end. I didn't quite credit Dr. Weber's breakdown, and am still confused about the character who poses as a nurse's aide throughout. What in the world is her motivation? The sandhill crane migration, and the environmental politics surround it, serve as a background, and a highly poetic one at times, but is there more to it than - these birds are simply a good example of focused and useful consciousness? The story's greatest success lies in elucidating the shifting and fragile nature of human consciousness and memory. Otherwise, this book is overlong, particularly as regards Dr. Weber, whose deterioration I found quite forced. show less

This is a rambling, overly long book that examines the concept of self, how it shapes our perception of those around us and how they, in turn, reshape our own sense of self. Synopsis: The thread that holds it together is the story of a man convalescing from the trauma of a near-fatal accident. His grasp of reality is shattered and his sister, whom he sees as an imposter, has appealed to a famous cognitive neurologist for help. From there it becomes a case of ‘Physician, heal thyself’ as the good doctor suffers an identity crisis of his own – is he someone with a genuine interest in his patients' welfare or is he just mining them for case histories to pump up his book sales, as his critics suggest? Even knowing the twist at the show more end, I still found this to be fascinating on a second reading because of the way it explores the brain/mind connection and humakind’s impact on the balances in the natural world as a whole. show less

The Echo Maker (Jehona e kujtesës) i Richar Powers, është i ngjashëm me filmat që nderohen me Oskar. Dramatik, prekës, lirik, i thjeshtë dhe të lë mbresa të thella. * * * "Jehona e kujtesës" nuk është një elegji për të shkuarën, as një përshëndetje mirëseardhëse në jetë, por një eksplorim në detaje të hollësishme i betejës së përditëshme për të mos e humbur jetën. * * * Është një Libra i madh dhe i rëndësishëm për letërsinë e sotme. Është aq i vërtetë, saqë nëse çrregullimi i trurit, shkaktuar nga aksidenti me nuk do të ishte metaforë, do besoje deri në fund se migrimi i shpirtit, si simptomë klinike ndodh nën diellin e shtatorit, njëherësh me migrimin e lejlekëve duke show more lajmëruar stinën e vjeshtës. Ai përpiqet të flasë. Asgjë nuk del nga goja e tij, përveç një fishkëllime të thatë. show less