Rating: 
Summary: Inspiring book -- a pleasure to read! Brava! Good Doctora.
Review: This is an inspiring book that's a pleasure to read. It gives the reader the vicarious enjoyment of being part of a noble endeavor. In an age of "road rage" and the obsessive accumulation of more and more things (which often do not make us happy), it's exhilarating to experience a taste of Dr. Linnea's life. Dr. Linnea shows us how one can give up almost all the material possessions and creature comforts of the modern world and still find meaning, happiness, and personal fulfillment. Dr. Linnea has created for herself a significant life. A life with much to teach a troubled world. While missionaries have long sacrificed themselves to serve God, win the eternal salvation of lost souls, and earn a place in the pantheon of saints, Dr. Linnea does it for the pure humanity of the effort. Goodness is indeed its own reward in this Amazon outpost. Because of Dr. Linnea's "wonderful life", many lives have been enriched and some even saved. More importantly, countless hours of suffering have been alleviated. This is the most humane thing: ending or reducing pain. We all have to die but we shouldn't have to suffer or endure years of pain when a cure is available. Dr. Linnea provides the cures that often would not be provided otherwise. She treats the sick and asks nothing in return; she allows her patients to keep their personal integrity; she respects their beliefs; she grants them respect and maintains their dignity; I think this could be called love. On the surface, this book is about a one woman medical practice hidden in the Amazon rain forest. Beneath the surface, however, it is about finding meaning in a world that too often seems to be without meaning. Dr. Smith's "life-example" has the power to let you view your own life differently; perhaps with a clearer insight. With one brave decision, everything can change. For Dr. Smith and thousands of her patients, the change has had life-sustaining significance. I felt a similar elation reading this book that I experienced when the US Women's Soccer Team won the World Cup. I was proud that our young women could show the world such excellence in a non-American sport. What else would this generation of young American women do in the future now that they saw what they could do? It is the power of their "example" that is so exciting. I stood and cheered in the privacy of my living room. Dr. Linnea is such an example, as well. She's one of our own; a human we can be proud of -- a human we would gladly point to if Extra Terrestrials came to earth and wanted to interview an exemplar human being for the Encyclopedia Galactica. Better yet, she is in "real time"; she is alive and still "on-mission". You can be a part of her life. You can support her efforts. You can even bring her medicine if you visit the Amazon -- as some adventurous tourists do. You can visit her website (run by her relatives in the USA.) As a bonus, the book is very well written and designed. It is also moderately priced. La Doctora demonstrates the best in mankind. The message is optimistic; the ending, happy. Reading it may make you happy. And maybe, as in my case, it may make you want to stand and cheer as you finish the last page. Keep up the good work Dr. Linnea and please write a sequel. Feeling good and feeling proud and feeling optimistic is definitely worth the price of admission.
Rating: 
Summary: The Great Doctora Isn't Quite Gripping
Review: This is somewhat of a minority viewpoint in comparison to the previous five customer reviews already written. I read this book because of the local publicity it received here in Wisconsin, the fact that I have been in Peru and in Amazon region (though not the same part as Dr. Linnea), am interested in Latin American culture, and speak fluent Spanish. Dr. Linnea doesn't. The one complete Spanish sentence in the book contains a major grammar error that most students wouldn't make mid-way through their first semester of college Spanish. Of the isolated Spanish words she uses, she gets a couple wrong. She can be forgiven for this. She obviously managed to communicate adequately with her patients and she's a physician, after all, not a linguist. I'm aware this seems like nitpicking, and this is not my reason for a mere 3-star review. What I find lacking in this book is emotional engagement with the reader. I liked this book passably, but wanted to like it so much more. Dr. Linnea is really the only character in it and she seems to be a rather private person. She gives us her opinions much more than her feelings. Maybe this is typical of the majority of physicians. We never really get to know her patients or any other person in the book. If she develops close relationships, we don't learn of them. Some patients improve and survive, some die, but it's a bit like a catalogue of people who barely have names or faces and come through her office (or she goes to them). I'm also interested in medicine and geography in general, and a book in a similar vein, that of a doctor practicing "backwoods medicine" that is truly wonderful (and that I'd hoped this one would resemble) is Dr. Abraham Verghese's MY OWN COUNTRY. (He treats AIDS patients in Appalachia in the mid-1980s.) Perhaps he's atypical in the way he becomes personally/emotionally involved with his patients or in the way that he is able to put human faces and lives on a disease and write about it all. Dr. Linnea, in spite of being a wonderful person who has done dangerous, extremely outstanding work, is not able (or chooses not) to do what Verghese did in his book. Unlike another customer who reviewed this, I definitely don't think this was ghost-written. Dr Linnea is right there, revealing not one iota more than she wants to. I think the "problem" can be seen right in her acknowledgements, when, regarding her publishers, she writes that they "gave me unlimited latitude in what I wanted to say and how I wanted to say it." Sorry, but this book needed much more editorial guidance. She's a physician, not a professional writer, and though this effort is quite passable, it could have been so much better. The book is informative, educational up to a point, gives a good perspective on "jungle" medicine" vs. the US mainstream practice thereof, and is culturally sensitive. (Though at one point I winced, when she said that the inhabitants, almost all of whom live in abysmal poverty, "seemed happy." This made me think of 19th century slaves in the US who, many contended "seemed happy.") There are a few funny moments, especially when Dr. Linnea describes w/ dead-on accuracy her encounters with the Peruvian bureaucracy, redtape and corruption. All in all, well worth reading, but don't expect great emotional engagement or gripping human drama.
Rating:
Summary: A "must read" for anyone interested in the Amazon
Review: To be honest, I was a little hesitant buying this book. I've read about 15 books on the Amazon and I thought this just might be another recap of the same journeys that I've read about. This was not the case at all. Once I picked up this book, I couldn't put it down. It was so well written, it kept me glued to every page. I couldn't help reading page after page to see what was going to happen next. I have visited the area that the author was working in and her story made me feel as though I was back in the jungle with her, experiencing all that she wrote about. I felt connected to her and the way she viewed the U.S. after vacationing in Peru. Although she doesn't come right out and "badmouth" the US, she does point out just how many comforts we take advantage of. She eludes to the emptiness we feel as Americans, having every material possession known to man, and still being unhappy. She discusses her hesitantcy to leave her American life behind in pursuit of a dream that seemed crazy at in point. In the final analysis, her story is a perfect example of how one person can make a difference.
Rating:
Summary: A "must read" for anyone interested in the Amazon
Review: To be honest, I was a little hesitant buying this book. I've read about 15 books on the Amazon and I thought this just might be another recap of the same journeys that I've read about. This was not the case at all. Once I picked up this book, I couldn't put it down. It was so well written, it kept me glued to every page. I couldn't help reading page after page to see what was going to happen next. I have visited the area that the author was working in and her story made me feel as though I was back in the jungle with her, experiencing all that she wrote about. I felt connected to her and the way she viewed the U.S. after vacationing in Peru. Although she doesn't come right out and "badmouth" the US, she does point out just how many comforts we take advantage of. She eludes to the emptiness we feel as Americans, having every material possession known to man, and still being unhappy. She discusses her hesitantcy to leave her American life behind in pursuit of a dream that seemed crazy at in point. In the final analysis, her story is a perfect example of how one person can make a difference.
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