The Dolphin People - Softcover

Krol, Torsten

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0061672963 ISBN 13: 9780061672965

Publisher: Harper Perennial, 2009

Synopsis

Shortly after the end of WWII, sixteen-year-old Erich Linden and his family have fled Germany and joined Erich's uncle, Klaus, in Venezuela, where they will begin a new life. But, en route to Klaus's outpost further inland, they encounter a storm and their plane crashes in the middle of the jungle. Stranded deep within Amazonia with no hope of rescue, they are discovered by the Yayomi, a violent and superstitious Stone Age tribe. The Yayomi believe the strangelooking foreigners are freshwater dolphins in human form—and the Lindens believe that as long as they can keep up the bizarre ruse they'll be safe. But the jungle is a dark, mysterious place, and no place for a family of sham dolphin-people who are ultimately left with only two choices: to escape or to die trying.

About this title

About the Author

Torsten Krol is the author of Callisto. Nothing further is known about him.

From the Back Cover

Shortly after the end of WWII, sixteen-year-old Erich Linden and his family have fled Germany and joined Erich's uncle, Klaus, in Venezuela, where they will begin a new life. But, en route to Klaus's outpost further inland, they encounter a storm and their plane crashes in the middle of the jungle. Stranded deep within Amazonia with no hope of rescue, they are discovered by the Yayomi, a violent and superstitious Stone Age tribe. The Yayomi believe the strangelooking foreigners are freshwater dolphins in human form—and the Lindens believe that as long as they can keep up the bizarre ruse they'll be safe. But the jungle is a dark, mysterious place, and no place for a family of sham dolphin-people who are ultimately left with only two choices: to escape or to die trying.

From the Inside Flap

Shortly after the end of WWII, sixteen-year-old Erich Linden and his family have fled Germany and joined Erich's uncle, Klaus, in Venezuela, where they will begin a new life. But, en route to Klaus's outpost further inland, they encounter a storm and their plane crashes in the middle of the jungle. Stranded deep within Amazonia with no hope of rescue, they are discovered by the Yayomi, a violent and superstitious Stone Age tribe. The Yayomi believe the strangelooking foreigners are freshwater dolphins in human form--and the Lindens believe that as long as they can keep up the bizarre ruse they'll be safe. But the jungle is a dark, mysterious place, and no place for a family of sham dolphin-people who are ultimately left with only two choices: to escape or to die trying.

--Kirkus Reviews

Reviews

Krol's bizarre second novel (after Callisto) sends a Nazi-sympathizer family into the wilds of the Amazon. Sixteen-year-old narrator Erich Linden is fleeing to Venezuela with his war widow mother, Helga, and effeminate younger brother, Zeppi, after the fall of the Reich. They've been sent for by Erich's uncle Klaus, who intends to marry Helga as part of a plan to change his identity to evade prosecution for war crimes. Once they arrive and are rebranded as the Brandt family, they head inland to their new home, but their plane crashes, leaving them stranded in the Amazon, where they are welcomed by members of the Yayomi tribe, who believe the Brandts are dolphins in human form, as prophesied by a tribesman's dreams. Gerhard Wentzler, a German anthropologist who has been living with the tribe, serves as a translator, helping the dolphins stay as long as possible, which isn't long. Though the dolphin conceit is a stretch and the climax is too chaotic to be fulfilling, Krol is adept at creating suspense while imbuing the story with an unexpected amount of compassion and tenderness. (Dec.)
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Krol, rumored to be an Australian writer intent on Pynchonesque invisibility, made a splash with Iraq War–oriented Callisto (2009), his second novel, thus triggering the American release of his debut. A mesmerizing storyteller with a taste for grotesque, wildly improbable satire, Krol brings together Nazi Klaus, in exile in Venezuela just after World War II, and his newly arrived, widowed sister-in-law and her two sons––Erich, 16, our able narrator, and 12-year-old Zeppi, whose maturing body carries a startling secret. A plane crash strands them in the jungle among a group of Yayomi, a fictional tribe much like the Yanomami. They believe the four fair strangers are dolphin people with magical powers, roles the family assumes with the help of a German anthropologist who knows nothing of the war. What ensues is a campy tragedy of errors and madness, a reverse Heart of Darkness, as the blood orchid of Nazi anti-Semitism takes root in Venezuelan soil, and Erich attains manhood under bizarre and deadly circumstances. Krol’s clever, gory, suspenseful, and outrageous novel asks, What is primitive? What is savage? --Donna Seaman

Edition details

• Publisher: Harper Perennial
• Publication date: 2009
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0061672963
• ISBN 13: 9780061672965
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 356