The Thanatos Syndrome

by Walker Percy Narrated by David Hilder

Overview

When Dr. Tom More (of Love in the Ruins) is released on parole from state prison, he returns to Feliciana, Louisiana, the parish where he was born and bred and where he practiced psychiatry before his arrest. Upon arriving, he notices something strange in almost everyone around him: unusual sexual behavior in women patients, a bizarre loss of inhibition, a lack of complexity in speech-even his own wife's extraordinary success at bridge tournaments, during which her mind seems to function like a computer.

With the ingenious help of his attractive cousin, Dr. Lucy Lipscomb, More begins to uncover a criminal experiment to “improve” people's behavior by drugging the local water supply. But beyond this scheme are activities so sinister that even Tom More wouldn't believe them if he hadn't witnessed them with his own eyes.

Editorial Reviews

Library Journal

When psychiatrist Tom More returns home to Feliciana, Louisiana, after doing time at a minimal security prison, he is dismayed by the bizarre behavior he encountersthe ``curious flatness of tone,'' the loss of sexual inhibition, of complex speech, even of context in conversation. More is further dismayed to discover that fellow psychiatrist Bob Comeaux is masterminding an unauthorized scheme to eradicate social ills by manipulating cortical functions through surreptitious doses of heavy sodium. And the suspense is only beginning, for More wants to investigate signs of sexual abuse at his children's school. The loss of human response smacks of a grade-B horror filmMore himself speaks of ``bodysnatchers''and the moral implications of social engineering, though given the most contemporary interpretation here, have already been considered. But in crisp, masterful prose Percy delivers a relentlessly compelling tale. BOMC dual main selection. Barbara Hoffert, ``Library Journal''

From the Publisher

There is ample evidence of Percy's brilliance in The Thanatos Syndrome - the droll Dixie anthropology, the pitch-perfect dialogue, the sheer intelligence everywhere on the page.... It is splendidly, uproariously catholic, as well.” —Douglas Bauer, Atlantic Monthly

Product Details

BN ID:	2940173927965
Publisher:	Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Publication date:	08/02/2012
Edition description:	Unabridged

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