Galapagos Regained

Actress Chloe Bathurst, newly employed as a zookeeper for scientist Charles Darwin, aspires to save her father from an arduous sentence in a workhouse; the Great God Contest might provide her with that opportunity. An ongoing challenge to definitively prove or disprove the existence of a creator, the Great God Contest offers a fabulous prize, and Chloe schemes to use Mr. Darwin’s unpublished work on evolution to disprove God and claim victory. But, Darwin’s pointed refusal sends her on an unbelievable adventure, as she heads to the Galapagos Islands herself to gather her own specimens, foil a monstrous plot, and rewrite the whole of history.

Galapagos Regained is the latest novel by wildly inventive and subversive author James Morrow. It reads like Indiana Jones meets Jane Goodall on a world-spanning escapade that includes everything from shipwrecks and airships, to hookah-based time travel, and two lost arks.

Morrow has certainly tackled the subjects of science and religion before, but never quite as whimsically or anarchically as he does here, crafting a novel as hilarious as it is thought-provoking. Galapagos Regained holds nothing sacred but life, and its madcap, twist-fueled momentum makes it an unexpected delight.