Susan Orlean's best-selling book The Orchid Thief (#1,096) came out in 1998. She wrote it following the case of a notorious theft of wild orchids from the Fakahatchee Strand State Preserve in Florida by John Laroche and his three Seminole confederates. She was intrigued by the newspaper article she had read on the case and decided to check it out for herself. Although much has changed in Florida in the twenty plus years since the book was published, the passion for orchids and collecting is as strong as ever.
Ms. Orlean wandered down so many fascinating rabbit holes in writing this book, she sucks the reader in just as surely as the muck of the Fakahatchee. So many things I did not know about this amazing state where I live! Although the book centers around the theft of the elusive ghost orchid from state land, I was surprised to learn from reading descriptions of this flower, that the orchid on the cover of the book I was reading was not a ghost orchid! I couldn't tell you what it actually was although it is beautiful. That was just one of the many surprises this book contained.
I finally got around to reading The Orchid Thief for my book club, and I'm so glad I did after reading and enjoying her non-fiction book The Library Book (See my post of 11/27/2018.). Here Ms. Orlean links up a string of anecdotes in each chapter, each more interesting than the last. I've seen how caught up people are in the orchid world at local orchid shows, but I never gave the bigger picture much thought.
I just know one thing for certain; I won't be in a hurry to take a field trip to the Fakahatchee Strand!
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