Pat Murphy
1986
Awards: Nebula
Rating: ★ ★ – – –
The Falling Woman is
set in Dzibilchaltún, a Maya archeological site near Mérida, Mexico.
The main character is an archeologist, Elizabeth Butler, who can see the
ghosts of the ancient Maya working and playing around her--often more
realistically than she can see her own live workmen and graduate
students.
Butler’s long-estranged daughter, who is going through a
sort of a lost period following the death of her father, comes to see
her and stays to work on the dig. Both mother and daughter then start to
see the ghost of a formidable Mayan priestess who can see them too, and who has unpleasant designs on both of them, including wanting Butler
to murder her daughter.
The book is clearly and
straightforwardly written, the plot is decently exciting and well paced,
and the subject matter certainly has potential. My major gripe with it
was that there were so many, many details about both the Maya and the
field work that didn’t sit right with me. And when I consulted with some
Mesoamerican archeologists of my acquaintance, they confirmed that most
of these details were either goofy or just plain wrong.
The first thing that jarred me out of the story’s dreamland ghost story vibe was when Butler, the head of the dig, actually
puts her cigarette out on the wall of
one of the site’s stone temples. Not only would a burning cigarette
accelerate the disintegration of an irreplaceable artifact thousands of
years old, but it would, as my experts pointed out, contaminate her
charcoal and radiocarbon samples.
One of the other archeologists
on Butler's crew is described as having a habit of putting any piece of
pottery he finds into his mouth, straight out of the ground, and
cleaning it off with his spit on the spot. My experts confirmed that you
should use water; no one uses saliva because it's
acidic and damaging. Also, it's gross.
One of Butler's graduate
students explains that the best times to survey are at dawn and dusk,
because you are better able to see regular lines and lumps in the ground
that might signal human construction. My experts, who have used local history, vegetation patterns, and aerial photography to scout locations, and who know that lumps in the ground that form randomly over thousands of years can be quite deceiving, say: “Completely
silly. Silly to the max.”
At one point, the archeologists in the
book talk about there having been trade between Teotihuacán (in Mexico)
and Guatemala, as evidenced by the fact that Teotihuacán pottery has
been found in Guatemala. I had been taught by Jared Diamond’s
Guns, Germs, and Steel to
be wary of a lot of north-south trade in the Americas, so I questioned
that as well. My experts said that, yes, there was indeed trade all over
Mesoamerica. So some pottery from Teotihuacán did make its way to
Guatemala. But it is not clear whether it was direct face-to-face trade
or passed gradually from one group to another. In addition, most of the
Teotihuacán-style pots in Guatemala are actually locally-made
imitations.
And finally (or finally for what I have the patience
to write here), the central plot of the book rests on the assumption
that the Maya performed human sacrifices, in the form of throwing
people into their cenotes (sacred wells). My experts say that this idea is
based on a story that was published at the beginning of the 20th
century, itself based primarily on one dubious statement made by a 16th century
Spanish explorer.
I wanted to get into the story. I
really did. And I might have been able to if it had been a little less
serious about itself. I am willing to overlook a lot of flaws and
suspend quite a hefty chunk of disbelief for the sake of a good story--as long as the story isn't pretending to be any more expert than it is. The main problem here is that the book
purports to present a realistic portrayal of an archeological dig
(aside from the ghosts), but that the inaccuracies poke too many holes
in that realism and the whole thing thus falls apart.
Take
Raiders of the Lost Ark as the best possible counter-example.
In
Raiders, you have a guy whose primary tools, rather than a
Marshalltown
trowel and a whisk broom, are a .45 revolver and a bullwhip. He spends
far more time punching out Nazis and romancing his lady friend than
carefully sifting through ancient trash piles. It is a completely
unrealistic portrayal of archeological field work. But it is an absolutely
classic adventure, and doesn't pretend to be anything but.
One of my expert archeologists cited above is actually also one of the world's biggest fans of
Raiders.
We saw it together in the theater when it first came out; I remember him laughing heartily when Indiana Jones’s workmen are digging
for the entrance to the Well of Souls with giant, artifact-destroying
shovels, and they hit the roof with a huge thunk, ripping off a
piece of the ancient wood.
He went out and bought a fedora the next day.
An earlier version of this review originally appeared on
Cheeze Blog.
Vernor Vinge
