"A book is a mysterious object, I said, and once it floats out into the world, anything can happen. All kinds of mischief can be caused, and there's not a damned thing you can do about it. For better or worse, it's completely out of your control."
A murder, a vanished tropical island, a thwarted love affair...clues to the origin of Charles Darwin's famous theory. A nameless narrator, abandoned on an island soon to be obliterated by volcanic activity, tells the story of his life and exile from England.
The tale is as extraordinary for its observations of a surreal natural history as for the dark twistings of human nature it reveals. His particular interest is beetles—a passion he shares, most literally, with the idolized friend of his school years, Charles
Darwin—and his reckless pursuit of the golden scarab has led him to a place that mirrors the Galapagos in the utter singularity of its fauna and flora. Blood-sucking mistletoe and amphibian swallows are but two of the fantastic species he records. Is this
the diary of a madman? Or is it the story of why Darwin published the book that destroyed his belief in God? Fearlessly original in conception, this novel evokes a collaboration between Jules Verne and Patrick O'Brian.
Confessing a Murder
