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Laurence Gonzales’s electrifying adventure opens in the jungles of the Congo. Jenny Lowe, a primatologist studying pygmy chimpanzees—the bonobos—is running for her life. A civil war has exploded and Jenny is trapped in its crosshairs…She runs to the camp of a fellow primatologist. The rebels have already been there. Everyone is dead except a young girl, the daughter of Jenny’s brutally murdered fellow scientist—and competitor.
Jenny and the child flee, Jenny grabbing the notebooks of the primatologist who’s been killed. She brings the girl to Chicago to await the discovery of her relatives. The girl is fifteen and lovely—her name is Lucy.
Realizing that the child has no living relatives, Jenny begins to care for her as her own. When she reads the notebooks written by Lucy’s father, she discovers that the adorable, lovely, magical Lucy is the result of an experiment. She is part human, part ape—a hybrid human being…
‘Human-Animal Hybrids In ‘Lucy,’ A Look To The Future?’, NPR’s Weekend Edition interview with Laurence Gonzales
Entertainment Weekly gives Lucy an ‘A’
“A gripping sci-fi thriller…The author’s got Crichton’s gift for page-turning storytelling, but also a vivid, literary-grade prose style, and a knack for getting inside his characters’ heads.”
“Fast-paced…An all-season treat…Does time ever flow when you’re caught up in this one!”
—NPR’s All Things Considered
“Both heartbreaking and heartwarming, hard to put down and hard to forget. It is original, like Lucy herself.”
—Associated Press
“Lucy is a great read—and not just for adults. It’s not classified as a young adult novel, but it could easily become a YA hit as well as a bestseller in the general fiction market.”
—Chicago Sun-Times
“A Crichton-like thriller.”
—NPR’s Weekend Edition