https://booktrib.com/2021/09/14/talk-to-me-shows-sign-language-may-be-the-key-to-communicating-with-our-favorite-animals/

If the measure of a good story is how often you think about it after you are done, then Talk to Me (Ecco), a new novel by T.C. Boyle, hits the mark. In fact, as I finished, I closed my eyes and let what I had just read wash over me, trying not to judge the characters’ morality — or lack thereof — but instead to feel the impact of having gotten to know them. This is not a happy tale, but it is one that will move you and make you think, which is something I always look for in a book.

Told through alternating narrators, Talk to Me follows the story of Sam, a chimpanzee taken from his mother as an infant and raised by Guy, a professor and researcher, as human. The goal of Guy’s research, initially, is to see if Sam can not only be taught to talk using sign language but also to think.

We meet Sam and Guy through Aimee, a college student who stumbles across them as they make an appearance on the television game show To Tell the Truth. Guy is telegenic and Sam is adorable, charming the cast and the television audience with his clothes and ability to answer questions. Shortly after, Aimee finds herself outside Guy’s office with a job offer to work with Sam at his ranch, provided the interview goes well.

AN INSTANT BOND

From their first meeting, it is clear that Aimee and Sam have a special connection. For Aimee, this quickly becomes more than a job; she is devoted to Sam and drops out of school to spend all of her time with him and Guy, who eventually becomes her lover.

The first section of the book is devoted to telling Sam’s journey through Aimee and Guy. It’s not until the second section that we are introduced to Dr. Moncrief, Guy’s boss and the professor who owns Sam. We learn that Sam is just one of several chimps who are being taught to communicate and live as humans in the hopes that this will reveal some higher-order thinking and reasoning. While Dr. Moncrief never narrates, his character is evident through his treatment of others, beginning with Sam and the other chimps at the Barn, the chimp research facility.

To say more would spoil the thoughtful layers of this story. As each character, including Sam, comes to learn more about the world, who has the power to make decisions for them and the impact of those decisions, we are forced to ask ourselves some questions: The straightforward variety like “What is right?” and “What responsibility do humans bear for their animal research subjects?” in addition to more complex queries like “What is the cost of fame, success and trust?”

LANGUAGE AND LOVE

While not a happy story, Talk to Me feels real and relevant because none of the characters are perfect. They each have motives driven by ego, identity, money and reputation. Like all of us, they struggle to understand love and expectations well as the accountability those two crucial factors bring to any relationship. And at its core, the novel reflects on both the value and limits of communication and our ability to hear and understand only what we choose to.

Near the end, Guy thinks, “it was his fault too for believing in something as absurd as the power of language to construct a world out of nothing.” Isn’t that something we all believe?

Published by Ecco on September 14, 2021

T.C. Boyle tells stories that that are entirely original. His novels showcase the diversity and absurdity of the human experience. In Talk to Me, his focus is on the quasi-human experience of a chimpanzee who has been raised as a human.

Boyle draws on the work of Jane Goodall, the television appearances of J. Fred Muggs, and the episodic rise and fall of a branch of psychology that studies chimpanzees to gain insight into human cognition. Talk to Me is set in the 1970s. Its star is a chimpanzee named Sam who was stolen from his mother in infancy, taken to a breeder in Iowa, and loaned to a psychology professor in California named Guy Schermerhorn. The professor raises Sam in a human environment, teaches him sign language, and hopes to propel himself to fame and academic stardom by having Sam appear as a guest on Johnny Carson’s Tonight Show.

Several of the chapters are written from Sam’s perspective. Boyle supplies the vocabulary that Sam lacks to capture the essence of his experience, his emotions and reactions, his joys and fears. Maybe Boyle stretches the ability of a chimp to engage in complex reasoning, but maybe he doesn’t. The point is, we can’t know a chimpanzee’s thoughts, which is why using them as research animals raises serious ethical questions about primate experimentation. A priest in the novel, convinced that Sam has a soul, even baptizes Sam — another stretch, perhaps, but if souls exist, who is to say that animals can’t have them?

We quickly learn that Guy’s wife has left him and that Sam isn’t adjusting well to her absence. Early in the novel, a student named Aimee Villard — an introverted young woman who isn’t sure what she wants to make of her life — sees Sam on To Tell the Truth and knows she wants to meet him. She applies for a job at the ranch where Guy is raising Sam. As soon as she arrives, Sam — who has been on a rampage and is about to escape — becomes calm and subdued. He bonds instantly with Aimee and she returns his affection. Aimee finds in Sam what she has never found in a human relationship. Guy is thrilled to have an assistant who can control Sam. He’s also happy that Aimee is pretty and quickly seduces her. Aimee is happy to have a sex life but is even happier that she can spend all her non-coital time interacting with Sam.

Guy is a self-centered jerk, but the novel’s primary villain is Donald Moncrief, a professor in Iowa who owns Sam. Conflict arises between Guy and Moncrief. Guy has staked his academic reputation on Sam, while Moncrief is certain that evolutionary psychology and primate studies are a dead end. Besides, Sam is getting too old to continue living as a human. Yet living as a human is all Sam has ever known. If part of that lifestyle goes against his instincts (he’d rather be climbing trees than sitting in a chair and answering Guy’s questions), his relationship with Aimee makes the tedium of a human lifestyle worth enduring. Like a human, Sam is motivated to make sacrifices in exchange for love and acceptance.

The story takes off when Aimee is separated from Sam. The scenes of Sam in a cage —not understanding how to live without Aimee, not understanding that he’s not a human, not understanding his relationship to the shrieking primates in neighboring cages — are powerful and affecting. The choices Aimee makes about Sam, including a very difficult choice at the novel’s end, are easy to understand and appreciate.

Boyle makes it easy to empathize with Aimee. Like Sam, although perhaps less selfishly, love motivates Aimee to make sacrifices. She wants to do what’s right for Sam, but the sacrifices she needs to make to let him live a meaningful life are overwhelming. Sam can’t be left unattended for a minute. His sense of humor, his curiosity, and his temper all motivate him to engage in acts that range from mild mischief to wholesale destruction. By the end of the novel, Aimee’s devotion to Sam is complete. She can have no relationships with humans. She can hold no ordinary job. She can’t continue her education. She can’t live in an apartment. But she perseveres because the alternative is to condemn Sam to a life in a cage, a life in which he is controlled by cattle prods, a life without love or fun or intellectual stimulation.

Talk to Me illustrates the difficult moral questions that surround scientific inquiry into animal behavior, as well as the philosophical questions that surround animal intelligence. Is there a difference in kind rather than degree between animal intelligence and human intelligence? Do animals have souls? Do people? If freedom is a cherished value for humans, why do humans feel entitled to put animals in cages? If most decent humans now regard slavery as fundamentally wrong, will a time come when decent humans believe it is wrong to cage animals?

Boyle’s prose is low-key, yet he occasionally delivers a sentence that shines: “In the evenings, he made the rounds of the bars, exploring what lack of purpose involved at its core.” Boyle proves again in Talk to Me that he is a masterful storyteller. The novel blends tragedy and offbeat comedy in a unique plot that is absorbing from beginning to end.

RECOMMENDED

No trip to the local zoo is complete without a visit to some of the primates. They’re cute and playful, and their sometimes human-like behavior is always entertaining to watch. Talk to Me by author T. C. Boyle tells the story of one of these clever primates—and the researchers who made him a part of their own unusual little family....

Full review published on NightsAndWeekends.com and aired on Shelf Discovery

Like this Style I This autumn And very deconstruction writing. It was interesting how the story came going back-and-forth based on this chimp. Amy was the one who really But we really loved Sam and chimp. And how you can see Was a crazy story I have everybody involved and it was very interesting. Professor at the school named Gary It's not a really nice person. He always been falling in love with his assistance. Sam got really jealous because Amy would really spend a lot of time with him.. It's very interesting when the monkey is taken away to a L AP. This is when things got really bad. Amy went to IOW a To help Sam. And then it takes off and when she steals Sam. And there's so many trusting terms at this point you And you will like the book

When I say that I have learned to never ever think that I know what a T.C. Boyle book will be like because every time I go into thinking one thing and come away from it thinking something completely different.. This book is a ride from the first page until the last and finding the words to describe that ride are harder than just telling you to read this book. Because you should.

Talk to Me is the story of Sam the chimp who’s worked with a professor to learn sign language and be able to communicate with him as well as the assistants that help not only care for Sam but also get him to behave and interact with humans.

While the premise was so good and interesting I found myself unable to get through most of this book and unfortunately had to #dnf it. The writing is very good and it reads a little more like literary fiction-the pacing and action very withheld.

Book Review

Talk to Me by T.C. Boyle
Fiction
352 Pages

Short Synopsis

Talk to me is a straightforward look into Aimee’s obsession with a chimpanzee that she starts working with while in college. This particular chimpanzee is learning sign language and is just as obsessed with her as she is with him. When the program ends & Sam is taken to live in a cage, Aimee can’t take it. She takes some pretty drastic measures to help Sam.

My Thoughts

I enjoyed reading Talk to Me. The premise of chimpanzees being able to communicate with humans is exciting. Although fictional, it feels like much of the detail is accurate.

Chimpanzee strength and behaviors were clearly expressed. The caged chimpanzees saddened me & the reference to lab research was disheartening. It is hard to imagine using such smart animals in such a vile way.

I felt where Aimee was coming from, but her good intentions weren’t well thought out.

The characters weren’t especially likable, even Aimee. She is not your happy-go-lucky type of gal. The professor in charge is a misogynist. Aimee’s love interest is another professor who is in charge of Sam and is much older than her. He is a pompous self-serving ass. Sam is my favorite character by far.

Although this story is a bit of a downer, it is a great story. It is well written and Sam’s antics are quite amusing. Life is not all roses. 🌹Talk to Me isn’t all roses either. Life doesn’t always go the way it is planned and good intentions sometimes fall short.

Thank you NetGalley, T.C. Boyle, & Ecco Publishing for providing an ebook to read and review.

Good friends of mine (I was in their wedding) moved to Reno to work with two young chimps in sign language. When I heard about Talk to Me, I was thrilled that Netgalley and Ecco publishers allowed me to read about Sam the chimp.

Aimee, an introverted college student, sees Sam and his professor Guy on To Tell the Truth. She is smitten and applies to work with Sam. An interesting novel!

Trigger warning: injuries to animals during experimentations.

T.C Boyle is one of my favorite writers. His latest is a winner. It's a sad and funny story about a chimp named Sam. Sam is a chimp who is able to speak via signing. He is in a lab study with a woman named Aimee who starts to bond with him. Questisons about should we keep animals in labs, can we tame wild animals, and can they have human traits are all explored. Being an animal rights person this was a great book that talked about these serious issues without preaching, I strongly recommned this to book clubs, animal rights groups, and anyone interested in the role animals play in our life. Truly one of my favorite T.C Boyle books. Thanks to Ecco and Netgalley for the advacne copy. .

I loved Sam, liked Aimee, didn't like Guy at all. I kept waiting for the 'hilarious' part mentioned in the advertising for this book. Really? Hilarious? I just thought it was heartfelt and ultimately devastatingly sad.

The usual good writing by T. C. Boyle, but the book just made me so sad.

𝐇𝐞 𝐝𝐢𝐝 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧. 𝐎𝐟 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐬𝐞 𝐡𝐞 𝐝𝐢𝐝. 𝐀𝐧𝐲𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐲 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐧, 𝐧𝐨 𝐝𝐢𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐟𝐢𝐫𝐬𝐭 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐥𝐚𝐢𝐝 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐧 𝐚 𝐡𝐨𝐭 𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐨𝐮𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐝 𝐚 𝐛𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐰𝐢𝐫𝐞: 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐢𝐬 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐟𝐢𝐫𝐬𝐭 𝐤𝐧𝐨𝐰𝐥𝐞𝐝𝐠𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐡, 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐢𝐫𝐭𝐡 𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐚𝐥, 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭, 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐥𝐚𝐦𝐨𝐫, 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐠𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧.

This book hit me in the gut, boy did it. Maybe it’s the chimp thing for me-I remember growing up watching Hollywood films full of them, usually slapstick comedy but recalling other films, like Project X, not all centered around silly chimp shenanigans. Chimps were a fad, anyone remember Michael Jackson and Bubbles? Dressing them up in human clothing, spitting our image back at us, therein lies the problem. It’s not truly, at least in this novel, about understanding the language of chimps but understanding the creatures on a human level, an erasure of everything that makes Sam his own species. Teaching him sign language, the beauty and stunning wonder it inspires that chimps can communicate, but what is the cost when weighed by human expectation and desires.

The novel opens with UCSM undergrad Aimee Villard watching a tv show that spotlights animal behaviorist Professor Guy Schermerhorn, a man who is ‘teaching apes to talk’ but it is the Chimp, Sam who captures her heart. The thrill that this beautiful animal could communicate with a human being, why it’s groundbreaking! If it’s true. When she finds a flyer stating that Professor Schermerhorn is looking for students to ‘assist in his cross fostering project’, it feels like fate. Guy has more problems than he can juggle, not just in learning to communicate with Sam but in ‘containing him’. Add it all up, the financial strain, the desperate need for support for his program, the students working on his project, the shadow of his mentor but nothing is harder than Sam’s will. He is still an animal, with the instincts and strength to match but is he more? Guy believes Sam is special. In his heart he knows Sam is capable of thought, of planning, of predicting actions that will lead him to get what he wants. Aimee is there at the right time as the chimp makes a mad dash past his ‘captors’ and Sam chooses her- so begins the bond between them and everything that unfolds. If she is drawn to Guy, her heart is far more entwined with Sam’s. How does an animal deal with jealousy? How does man?

It becomes, for Aimee at least, about so much more than getting to the fruit of animal knowledge. More than discovering everything Sam, close link to man, knows she wants love. Sam’s thoughts, feelings reach out to the reader from the page, his fears, his knowledge and the horrors he meets. What ‘good’ does it do for him to communicate with humans, to be an animal in the midst of our chaotic, noisy world? It is heartbreaking, his hunger to understand himself, his confusion about what he is (isn’t he human?) not recognizing himself in his own species, thanks to human meddling. The rage of abandonment, abuse, betrayal… it’s a bit of a horror story if you think about it. We are, it seems in this novel, searching to see ourselves not Sam. Where is his place in the world, in his own fate? Why this desire to make Sam more human, and is making him more self-aware a good thing? Where can any of this possibly lead? No one is really seeing Sam, only their own reflection, even Amy. In many ways, it is an erasure of his natural instincts, as if communication with humans surpasses his own form of being. Dr. Moncrief is an interesting character too, the ‘pioneer of cross-fostering chimps’, and a hell of an example of “alpha male”. Everyone seems to have their own motives.

I was moved, for Sam’s sake, particularly as time encroaches and imprisons… all that fear, waiting. The mutual love between he and Amy, the strange dynamic between Amy and Guy…. all the misguided acts that threaten not just the project but all of their lives. This novel had me wondering about man and nature, who is the beast? 𝘛𝘢𝘭𝘬 𝘛𝘰 𝘔𝘦 is a fascinating way to confront the bigger questions of man, of species. I was deeply engaged- I was disturbed and felt bonded to Sam but not in the way Amy was. I longed for him to be free and true to his nature. People project onto each other, why wouldn’t they project onto animals? That is a huge obstacle, we barely relate to our own species most of the time. Even if animals could communicate their vision of a creator, I don’t think we would ever understand it. Why must we soil the very things we attempt to understand?

Thought provoking.

Publication Date: September 14, 2021 Available Tomorrow

Ecco

Do animals have souls?Are they self aware? Can they think, plan, even lie?

In this story which takes place in the 1970s, Dr Donald Moncrief of Davenport University in Iowa has pioneered the cross-fostering of chimpanzees in human home environments with a focus on language acquisition and comparative development. His protege, Dr Guy Schermerhorn, has obtained a chimp from Moncrief to do a similar project at UCSM where he is an associate professor of comparative psychology. Guy and his wife have been raising Sam the chimp on a ranch provided by the university and have taught him to communicate with sign language.

But now Guy's wife has had enough and has left him so he advertises for students willing to assist him in his project with Sam. Aimee Villard, who is pursuing an early childhood education major at UCSM, is very eager to volunteer after seeing Guy and Sam on tv. Everyone warns her NOT to get emotionally involved with the chimp, but uh-oh! It's love at first for both of them.

Everything seems to be going very well in the study but then the axe falls: as so often happens in academia, the grant money eventually dries up and Dr Moncrief wants Sam returned to his lab in Iowa. Aimee is devastated but what can she do??

Sam has a neat personality--quite humanlike in many ways; wild in others. Aimee seems quiet and shy but shows herself to have quite a strong character, determined to do what she feels is right.

There are several issues in this story that would make for some interesting group discussions. If you are interested in the topic of sentience in animals, I also recommend Ismael by Daniel Quinn.

I received an arc of this new novel from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Many thanks.

Having been charged with reading a TC Boyle's book for a grant that I received - I had some idea of what type of book I'd be reading. However- this one exceeded my expectations.

Great story - wonderful characters. Definitely intriguing and thought provoking. This one will stay with me for some time.

Talk to Me
By T.C. Boyle

I have been a fan of Boyle's work for many years. He writes some very thought-provoking books. "Talk to Me", in my opinion, is the best one yet.

This is a story about humans interacting with another species – namely chimpanzees. It deals with how people attempt to remake animals in their own image – much like we are told that God has done with man. The problem here is that men are NOT omniscient and do not understand how very close to human, intellectually and emotionally, animals may be.

The story is told from both the humans' points of view and Sam the chimp's. Because the humans to a greater or lesser degree don't recognize Sam's abilities and understanding, they fail to see beyond their attempts to communicate with sign language or realize how advanced he is.

Sadly, this seems to be the case with so much of our research using these animals as guinea pigs. There is indeed much to ponder here about man's relationship with the world around him.

Talk to Me by T. C. Boyle is a very highly recommended novel about a chimp who has been taught to communicate via sign language.

Aimee Villard, a university student, applies for a job assisting animal behaviorist and professor Guy Schermerhorn in caring for Sam, a juvenile chimp he has taught to speak in sign language. As soon as she shows up, Sam bonds with her and Guy is also attracted to her. She takes on assisting with the teaching and caring for Sam with a natural ease. Guy is anxious to use Sam's ability to communicate through sign language to further his career, hopefully with an appearance with Sam on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. When Dr. Moncrief, the nefarious Iowa professor who owns Sam as well as a large number of other primates, decrees that teaching chimps to communicate is passe, he collects all his chimps, including Sam, and puts them in cages at his containment facility. Aimee, who has bonded with Sam too, leaves California for Iowa where she plans to offer to work at Moncrief's facility for free in order to be near Sam.

As expected from Boyle, the quality of the writing is skillful and superlative. The story is both a farce and a tragedy and I became invested in the plot immediately. Set in California during the mid 1980s, Boyle immediately captured the time period and setting at the opening when Aimee first sees Sam on TV and later a notice on a bulletin board looking for assistants to help with Sam's care.

The narrative is told through Guy, Aimee, and Sam's point of view. While Guy and Aimee's narrative move the plot forward, Sam's provides an awareness and emotional insight into his reactions and thought processes concerning what is happening to him. Their relationships also portray a love triangle of sorts while simultaneously exploring the consciousness, intercommunication, and analyzing the awareness of inter-species connections.

As a character study, the portrayal of Sam and his thoughts and feelings is mesmerizing and compelling. Following the actions and thoughts of Aimee and Guy reflect a more expected and anticipated development of their characters. Aimee is certainly the more nuanced character although Sam is also portrayed with and acuity and compassion. She has a connection with and love for Sam, but no legal rights. She is unable to turn her back on him, knowing the abuse Sam will face at the hands of Moncrief, who is a classic antagonist. Guy is an opportunistic pragmatist who, although he cared for Sam, is more interested in furthering his career.

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of HarperCollins.
The review will be published on Barnes & Noble, Google Books, and Amazon.

As a TC Boyle fan, I found this book consistent with his ability to draw the reader in with a quirky, interesting take on some obscure but real historical occurrence. Talk to Me is the story of Sam, a chimpanzee who learns American Sign Language to communicate as part of a university research project. I believe this coincides with a real project started in 1973 at Columbia University involving a chimpanzee named named Nim Chimpsky and researcher Herbert Terrace. Professor Terrace’s office was in Schermerhorn Hall, which Boyle cleverly incorporates into the name of one of the main characters in the novel, Guy Schermerhorn. As Sam grows up in a house managed by Guy with the help of volunteers, a student named Aimee becomes more and more involved and in love with both Guy and Sam. When the lead researcher pulls the plug on the project, Aimee goes to extreme lengths to protect Sam. In this part of the book, Boyle gets into the political aspects of animal research in the same manner as he has addressed controversial issues in previous novels such as Tortilla Curtain and When the Killing’s Done. Caution: the book does contain some brief descriptions of animal cruelty as well as some graphic descriptions of animal attacks on humans. Overall, the storyline builds in intensity over time hooking the reader to keep going to discover the outcomes. I rated it four stars as I found the beginning of the book a little slow and the back and forth chapters with different characters’ perspectives of the same events a little confusing. But once I got into the flow, the book was hard to put down. Depressing but somewhat satisfying ending as the “villains” suffer some ironic consequences.

This is definitely one of the very interesting books that I have picked up in the past few months. Let me ask the question to you: what would you do if you see a talking chimpanzee on the TV that happens to be a test animal for a professor at your college. Would you randomly decide to become its nanny or would you just ignore the fact that the chimpanzee exists?

Aimee did the former. Not only she became the nanny of Sam the Talking Chimp, she took it few steps further while losing herself in her ethical and moral dilemma to become chimp’s mum. She believed that Sam is not some lab rat, but almost a human with similar intellect and moral compass. When the actual owner of the chimp decided that the experiment is not going where he wanted to it be and relocate the chimp, Aimee did what every mother would want to do after a messy divorce where father wants to take the child to another state: first moved to new state, then take her baby back

It was an engaging story told from 3 different perspectives including Sam’s depicting Sam’s development while focusing on Aimee’s obsession. If you are interested in tests on animals to figure out their language capabilities in a family drama form, give this book a chance

This is a really good story.

Sam is a chimpanzee and, as part of a study, he is raised as a human and taught to communicate. Aimee sees him on television and decides to volunteer to work for the study.

The novel raises a lot of questions about what constitutes personhood.

And this is an animal story, so definitely don't go into this thinking there will be a happy ending. Because that would be foolish.

I want to be clear- yes, I did enjoy “Talk to Me” by T.C. Boyle. Yes, I recommend it to readers. But the book I was promised in the blurb is not the book I read.

I thought I was reading a “hilarious” “interspecies love triangle”- I pictured “I Love Lucy”, with an adorable chimp-child. “Cue the laugh track.”

What I did read was a thoughtful and engrossing book. A book with dark and troubling undertones that made me feel uncomfortable. Who was exploited most in this book- the young college student who loved the chimp or the “experiment”? The experiment was “Sam”, a young chimp who was raised as a human and taught sign language.

Sam shares his thoughts in his own chapters in the book. The writing of his view of his life is so well done and so moving. The book ends tragically and left me feeling unsettled.

Thanks to NetGalley for an advance digital review copy. This is my honest review.

I struggled a bit with this book at the beginning. But after the first chapters it picked up the pace.