Swados too often speaks for her characters rather than letting her characters speak for themselves. The exposition and basic idea is intriguing: interesting if a bit self-consciously quirky set of characters, nice idea of a playwright and company using myth to expose and comment upon the essence of modern culture, and healthy smattering of various myths and cultural traditions.

But disappointing that the mythopoeic allusions won't instruct, unless the full myths are already familiar. And the denouement is painfully bad: perhaps Swados is thinking of Heart of Darkness or Aguierre or Rev Jim Jones, but if that's it, her plotting, writing, and action don't add anything to those original sources. For example: does Sasha, the erstwhile (and allegedly brilliantly gifted) leader, really think that a group of actors will learn how to live off the land in a matter of months or even years? Either Swados really pushed a load of rubbish on the reader in assuming we'd buy that, or the idea that Sasha suddenly started living in myth-time (in which events taking place over generations are depicted as personal interactions) deluded her into thinking it would work as a literal plot device. In the end, I'm not persuaded of anything but that Sasha and his group completely failed to implement or "test" their idea of getting back to nature. The experiment didn't fail so much as the experimenters did.

I'd given it 3 stars mid-way through, but it really doesn't live up to its own promise. ( )