[2] Plant dealer John Edward Laroche (born February 19, 1962, in Florida) was determined to find and clone the rare ghost orchid for profit.

Laroche's defense was a loophole in the law that he claimed allowed the Seminole natives to remove endangered species from the swamp.

[2] As Laroche told Orlean: I figured that we'd get what we needed out of the Fakahatchee and at the same time we'd bring so much attention to the law that the legislature would change it.

Positive reviews included that of Michael Pearson at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution who called it "a rare and exotic tale that shows a journalist's gifts in full bloom.

[6] Writing for the Chicago Tribune, Kristen Lillegard was harsher, noting the lack of forward motion in a story that "wilt[ed] under the weight of facts and figures.

The film is a pastiche of the process of adaptation, in which a successful but self-loathing Kaufman painstakingly tries to make Orlean's book into a "simple movie about flowers" without formulaic Hollywood tropes, or the metaphysical stylings he was acclaimed for in his screenwriting debut, Being John Malkovich.

He introduces her to a drug extracted from the ghost orchid that makes the world fascinating and she keeps seeing him after he posted pictures of her naked online.