The Overstory

February 19, 2018
Occupying the same thematic terrain as Annie Proulx’s Barkskins, the latest from Powers (Orfeo) is an impassioned but unsatisfying paean to the wonder of trees. Set primarily on the West Coast, the story revolves around nine characters, separated by age and geography, whose “lives have long been connected, deep underground.” Among these are a wheelchair-bound computer game designer; a scientist who uncovers the forest’s hidden communication systems; a psychologist studying the personality types of environmental activists; and a young woman who, after being electrocuted, hears voices urging her to save old-growth forests from logging. All are seduced by the majesty of trees and express their arboreal love in different ways: through scholarship, activism, art, and even violent resistance. Some of the prose soars, as when a redwood trunk shoots upward in a “russet, leathery apotheosis,” while some lands with a thud: “We’re cashing in a billion years of planetary savings bonds and blowing it on assorted bling.” Powers’s best works are thrilling accounts of characters blossoming as they pursue their intellectual passions; here, few of the earnest figures come alive on the page. While it teems with people, information, and ideas, the novel feels curiously barren.

Richard Powers's ambitious new novel tests the limits of audiobook narration in its breadth and complexity, number of characters and storylines it embraces, and sweeping conception of the bond between humanity and nature. Suzanne Toren's performance is expressive and well paced, and she is especially effective when delivering Powers's more lyrical passages. However, as the four featured characters fight to preserve a virgin forest, Toren's character voices are uneven--sometimes a marvelous expression of situation and state of mind, other times a regrettable mimicry of gender or ethnicity. So powerful are Powers's interlocking stories that the listener is simply carried along. This is a novel that many will embrace. D.A.W. � AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine