Jean-Christophe Rufin

Brazil Red is a 2001 French historical novel by Jean-Christophe Rufin which recounts the unsuccessful French attempt to conquer Brazil in the 16th century, against a background of wars of religion and a rite-of-passage discovery of the charms and secrets of the Amerindian world.

In 1699, Louis XIV of France sent an embassy to the most mysterious of oriental sovereigns, the Negus, or King, of Abyssinia (modern-day Ethiopia). Louis' hope was to lure that country into the political and religious orbit of France. Jean-Baptiste Poncet, young apothecary/physician to the pashas of Cairo, is the hero …