Green Fires: Assault on Eden: A Novel of the Ecuadorian Rainforest

by Marnie Mueller

Overview

Green Fires is the story of Annie Saunders, a disillusioned Kennedy-era Peace Corps volunteer, returning to Ecuador, hoping to come to terms with her traumatic experiences there. What she finds instead is a menacing and mysterious trail which she determinedly follows—ever deeper into the jungle—uncovering a sinister secret of international dimensions.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781880684597
Publisher:	Northwestern University Press
Publication date:	04/01/1999
Pages:	318
Product dimensions:	5.30(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

MARNIE MUELLER is an American novelist. She was born in the Tule Lake Japanese American Segregation Camp during WWII, the child of Caucasian parents protesting the treatment of those incarcerated there. Mueller's work has received numerous awards and citations, including an AMERICAN BOOK AWARD and a Barnes and Noble "Discover Great New Writers" selection. She currently lives in New York City. 

Editorial Reviews

"This is a remarkable achievement—a novel which presents the indigenous peoples of the rainforest without cliché or stereotype, romanticism or ideology. It dares to depict their struggle for survival with all its complexity and contradictions, moments of fear and cruelty, courage and love. With honesty and art, Marnie Mueller has written a story not just about the war waged against the rainforest and the indigenous peoples but against—and within—each one of us." —Larry Cox, Exec. Dir., The Rainforest Foundation
 


"...a riveting novel of adventure and suspense. . . . Marnie Mueller captures with rare honesty the complexity and cultural manipulations that occur when an oppressed people must fight for survival." —Kirkus Reviews


"An engrossing piece of fiction. . . . A very powerful tale with an even more powerful message, Mueller succeeds in painting vivid images in the hearts and minds of her readers." —Copley News Service

From the Publisher

The characters are well drawn, and the novel has adventure, intrigue and romance as well as politics.

New York Times Book Review

The politics of the rain forest, the fragile emotional state of a newly married couple and old-fashioned capitalist corruption are combined in Mueller's first novel, a historical romance that pushes against the boundaries of the genre. In 1969, Annie Saunders, an American and a Jew, and her new husband, German-born Kai Schmidt, are on their honeymoon in Ecuador, where she once worked as a Peace Corps volunteer. They soon find themselves taking a tortuous trip downriver to meet an eccentric German named Haberle, who lives deep in the rain forest and purportedly has befriended the indigenous tribes who are being napalmed by Somaxo, a multinational oil company that covets their territory. Paralleling the couple's journey into the political problems of the rain forest is Annie's private psychological journey through feelings of aggression toward her husband for his father's Nazi past, grief over her mother's suicide and confusion about her liberal beliefs. While Mueller presents the central relationship in realistic detail, she comes close to sentimentalizing the Indians and their lives in their eponymous ``Eden.'' Conrad's Heart of Darkness provides the themes here, but the mysterious man at the center of the literal and psychological journeys is driven by pacifism rather than by nihilism. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

This is a very political novel about an environmental war and personal exploration. Left-wing activist Annie Sauders had been a Kennedy-era Peace Corps volunteer in Ecuador. In 1969, when the novel begins, she returns to Ecuador with her new husband, Kai. They travel deep into the rain forest, together with their local guide and eventual friend, Mingo, and find themselves in the midst of the struggle between multinational oil companies and indigenous peoples. As they become more and more involved in the tragedy of the rain forest, they also work through their own conflicts, both within themselves and with each other. Annie is Jewish; Kai is German, the son of a Nazi. Both had troubled childhoods. The characters are well drawn, and the novel has adventure, intrigue, and romance as well as politics. Mueller, like Annie, served with the Peace Corps in Ecuador; this is her first novel. Recommended for public libraries.-- Mary Margaret Benson, Linfield Coll. Lib., McMinnville, Ore.

Library Journal

The characters are well drawn, and the novel has adventure, intrigue and romance as well as politics.

NY Times Book Review