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Summary: Loved this book!
Review: Anyone who is skeptical about organized religion will enjoy this book. I had no interest really in reading about missionaries in Africa and didn't think this book was for me, but one of my friends recommended it. The story has been eye-opening for me. The women in the book are very well-developed. It reminds me that women in the 50's weren't necessarily encouraged to go to college and were second-class citizens. Really makes me mad!!I truly enjoyed this book!
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Summary: Strong Characters and Great Descriptions
Review: When I first started to read the Poisonwood Bible, it was hard for me to get into but after the first 100 pages the story really took off for me and I loved it. Barbara Kingslover creates very believable and strong characters and the descriptions makes you feel like you are truly in the Congolese Jungle. The Poisonwood Bible takes us into the Congolese jungle and we view it through the eyes of the four Price Girls, Rachel, Leah, Adah and Ruth May. Their father Nathan is a Baptist minister who is on a mission to convert the Congolese people into Christianity and he takes the girls along with their mother to Africa. Each and every member of this family, changes through this experience never to be the same again. This was the first book I read by Barbara Kingslover and I do plan on reading more by her.
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Summary: A must read!
Review: Barbara Kingsolver's The Poinsonwood Bible is one of the best books I've read recently. Told from the point of view of five different women, this book has so much to offer. The author has such a unique style I almost felt as if I knew these girls when I was done reading. This book has everything from a revoultion, to a love story. You won't be able to put it down!
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Summary: A Great and Inlightening Book
Review: I've read meny books in life of 65 years. I must say this is one of the very best. To write about everybody in the same book is to me a wonderful talent. I felt I knew these people personaly. My thanks to Barbara Kingsolver for a few hours of per joy and excitement. Fred Crowley
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Summary: Tragically dull
Review: The Poisonwood Bible is a tragic, fiction adventure novel with a slight political outlook. The wife and four daughters of a strict preacher tell their story of a mission trip to the Belgian Congo in 1959. The Price family's unwillingness to adapt to their new environment is the cause of their tragic undoing. Over a course of 30 years, we watch a family survive Congo's fight for independence from Belgium, the murder of it's first elected prime minister, the CIA's attempts to replace him and an uncivilized culture attempt civilization only to watch their family to grow apart and move away, scared by their experiences in the untamed nations of Africa. Rachel, the shallow vain, eldest child tries to bring appearances to the attention of the starving African children, but they think her to be a monster and avoid the arrogant girl who grows up to live a distraught life. The first of twins, Leah is a brave headstrong girl who often lets her temper and emotions get the best of her. Leah becomes most attached to the Congo and grows up to marry a native. The second twin, Adah, creates in her mind the illusion that she is a cripple and must not speak nor be accepted as normal; she wishes to be pitied. The last of the Price daughters, Ruth May, lives a short life and dies young, but represents a very important role in society.
Overall, The Poisonwood Bible was a rather interesting read. While the words are simple and easy to understand, they build up complex sentences filled with metaphors and long descriptions, the book was set up like a series of hills: many adventures placed on either side of low, boring, dry valleys; there were a lot of scenes that simply dragged on for far too long. Although Barbara Kingsolver has been known to be an amazing writer, I personally strongly advise the casual reader to by pass this book. Unless you have loads of spare time, there are other books on the shelf.
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Summary: Hard to stay with, but worth it
Review: I almost gave up on this book a few times. I didn't like some of the characters or the way they narrated their chapters, but by the end of the book, I felt I had learned not only some very interesting history, but also how to look at Africa from different points of view. I read it last summer on a trip to Africa and still think about it often. Yes, the author's viewpoints don't always jive with popular beliefs, but that is what I think she was trying to do -- open our minds to the way others see the world and maybe try to understand why the Congo and its people think the way they do
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Summary: One-Shot Wonder
Review: This is an excellent and original novel with a unique premise. Four daughters and their mother travel to Africa with their fanatical preacher father, all from the USA, to do missionary work in the 1950's. The story is told in the first person through each of the daughters eyes and the mother's. I learned a lot about the Belgian Congo. Or, at least Barbara Kingsolver's interpretation of the Belgian Congo political situation. I am taking one star off for the lack of peril and conflict through the last 1/3 of the novel. The first 2/3 of Poisonwood are action packed as the family encounters lots of unusual situations and find themselves in a variety of jeopardy. Things get pretty slow towards the end; however, because the reader has already fallen in love with the interesting characters, you do want to read on, even through the slow finish, to find out how they all make out. Because the characters are so humorous, individually unique with voices all their own----great characterization can overcome plot defects later on. Unfortunately, Kingsolver has never come close to the success and acclaim of Poisonwood in her other novels. Both Pigs in Heaven and Prodigal Summer are horrible. Poisonwood is the only Kingsolver novel of hers I would recommend reading.
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Summary: Poisonwood reading!
Review: We read this book in our book club last month and four out of five of us hated this book. I really don't see the appeal at all. Yes, it was well written drom a literary point of view, but also dry as dirt. I had to force myself to finish the book. If it had not been a club read I would have given up! It's starts slow and then climaxes half way through. The last third of the book is a big anti-climax. Perhaps I enjoyed it less becasue I disagreed so much with her liberal political and religious views, but it was definatly one of the worst books I have read in recent memory.
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Summary: A masterpiece
Review: This book is so much more than some dumb women's feel-good bookclub garbage. From a purely literary standpoint, Poisonwood Bible is an exquisitely sculpted masterpiece. Each chapter is from a different person's point of view, and each one is written flawlessly--when the characters speak, they use their own dialect, vocabulary, and euphemisms, along with their own greatly differing points of view on what is happening to them; enough so that the chapter titles which tell you the character's name are almost irrelevant. I have never read a book with such completely and fully developed characters. Each daughter and their mother is complete, distinct unto themselves. They are fully human, making mistakes and even being unlikable at frequent intervals, yet since you are seing their failures through their own eyes, you cannot help but love them for it and become intimately invested in them and their story. Let me also add that anyone who loves puzzles will be delighted by Adah's chapters. The backwards poems are worth the price of the book in and of themselves!
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Summary: 30 years in the Congo.
Review: This book was a book I had so much about wasn't sure about reading it till my best friend read it and told me I just had to read it. Well I am glad I finally picked up this book. The Price family heads off to the Congo to go and do mission work for the church where there father works. Before going to the Congo the Price girls expect something different then what they are getting themselves into. Rachel the oldest of the Price girls doesn't want to be going to the congo she knows that it will be nothing like what she is expecting. As time goes on in the congo she starts to realize that she isn't happy there and would do anything to get out the place and away from her family. Rachel grows up a bit in the story but overall the I felt she stayed the same shallow way she was. Adah her and her twin sister Leah are feeling different about the congo. But no one would really know how Adah feels because she doesn't talk. When she and Leah were born Adah had problems in life. She walked with a lean to one side and rarely talked. As her time in the Congo goes on she starts to learn things that will change her for life. Overall in this book Adah was my favorite I loved how she grew up. Leah She is the one who has the brains of the family. She will voice her opinion on people and she also more of the beliver in her father then anyone. As time goes on Leah starts to fit into the Congo and there is where she starts to realize how happy she is there and how she has to look at her family and see the unhappiness in them. Leah grew up to be a strong person, but at times I felt like she was weak in ways. Ruth May the youngest of the Price girls and the one who seems to get into more trouble then anyone. As time goes on Ruth May starts to show the people of the Congo things that are in the US and starts to grow. Orleanna the mother of the girls and wife of Nathan as her time in the congo goes on she starts to realize that things aren't exactully what she expected them to be. She trys to make things better for the girls. But she too isn't happy there and would like to get out the Congo.. She was a strong woman, but towards the end her strength and happiness suffered. Overall this book covered 30 years of the familys life and there is alot that was told and alot that went on. This was a wonderful book that made me think about how each of the charactors would live and how they would go about there lives. This was my first book from this author and I hope to read more by her.
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