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Summary: Poisonwood Bible
Review: I had an incredibly hard time getting into this book. The beginning was slow, but it began to pick up through the middle. The middle was full of excitement and for about 100 pages I found it hard to put down. But toward the end I found it hard to finish. The excitement was over and it was back to dull. I believe the book could have been shortened from 600 pages to about 300 and it would have been better.
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Summary: unique and mesmerising
Review: I read alot of books and in all truthfulness I have never read another book like this one. Not in the plot line, which deals with the Congo and its political struggle 1960 to present and the lives of a (white) American family who come to convert the Africans to christianity. And not in the way it is written, so curiously devoid of cliches. I expected this book to be boring but instead i was drawn into the lives and the personalitites of the characters; their hopes and dreams and their heartaches; the ways in which they changed and in the ways they never wavered. Read this book.
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Summary: Five stars for writing, only 3 for story telling
Review: Kingsolver is marvelous narrativist. She writes with humor. She does well inside the heads of her four female characters. Maybe she knows wherein her talents lie and where they fail. She had a marvelous tragic hero here, but she only painted him from the view of his childish daughters. Even more from inside the wife's head would have given us a better aspect of the story she only hints at. All her male characters are pretty plastic. Would that we had a really great story about the impact of this misguided missionary on the cultures he seeks to impose his Jesusite politics on. As it is, it's like seeing the story through the wrong end of the telescope.
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Summary: The Poisonwood Bible is Bangala! (The good meaning!)
Review: Meet the Prices from Bethlehem, Georgia and of Kilanga, Congo. They are a family of 6- Nathan Price is the Father with a mission. Literally. Reverend Price is a preacher with one goal in mind. To save the Congolese from eternal damnation. Preaching fire and brimstone, he is willing to risk just about everything to baptize the local people in the little village of Kilanga in Congo. And he is willing to risk his family and just about everything precious to him to do that. In the process, alienating him from everyone in town, including his own family- and changing their lives forever. But this book isn't told by him. This book isn't about him. Their tragic story is told by Orleanna Price, Nathan's wife and the four daughters- Rachel, Leah, Adah and Ruth May. In their feminine, maternal and sisterly view of their experience in Africa is different from each other as night and day. And their voices are just as different. They all tell of their broken family, tragic losses and new hopes. They unearth the pain that made them who they are in Africa. I loved Orleanna's regretful and aching voice, Leah's poignant and soulful heart, Adah's eclectic thoughts (forwards and backwards) and Rachel's ... well, Rachel is Rachel. And Ruth May's childlike innocence and playfulness in her part of the story. And in the backdrop is the turbulent civil unrest and Congo's fight for their independence that always seemed to be looming in everyone's narration. And through them, I learned more about the Congo independence than I ever did in World History 101. Barbara Kingsolver's writing is amazing and unforgettable. It's magical and powerful the way she is able to weave in 4 different points of views into one book and make them all flow into one novel. It was just perfect. Although, most of the story takes place in Congo with strange sounding names and places... I felt like I was right there. Amidst the strange smells, the poverty stricken shanty neighborhoods and the life of Africa. The Prices are the main characters that reach out to you in such deep and provocative ways. But secondary characters like Nelson, Pascal, Chief Ndo and even Methusalah also stand out and make their mark, too. It's been a while since an Oprah's Pick moved me to tears. I am recommending this book to everyone I know.
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Summary: Can't get hooked
Review: I am only on page 40 of this book--but it's taken a week just to read that. I just can't seem to get into the story. I've read several books that keep me going and I'll stay up all night trying to read as much as possible. Maybe I prefer more suspenseful and action filled books. So far Poisonwood has been a yawn!! I guess I give it a chance --it did have good reviews.
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Summary: 75% great
Review: The first three-quarters of this book were truly outstanding.The author skilfully conveyed the different characters within the family and I really felt sympathetic towards their problems.Throughout there were beautiful descriptions of Congo.The problem I had with the book was that after the family's exodus the author goes on to describe what happened to each person during the next 30 years or so.I think this is unnecessary and I would have preferred to have imagined the family's future.The exodus itself was so dramatic and moving that it would be a perfect ending.This aside,I recommend you read this-the characters will stay in your mind for a long time.
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Summary: Highly recommended
Review: I finished this book in three working days because I had difficulty putting it down. The characters are well developed and the story takes place in an unfamiliar country that makes you feel like you're right there, and an interesting view of missionary life. These elements made my reading hours worthwhile. It might take a little while to get into the narrative but it's worth it.
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Summary: Fine historical novel; sheer poetry
Review: Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible is the finest historical novel I have read. It is a masterpiece of fiction set against regrettable events that are called to our conscience by the power of the written word, and inevitable and intertwined life and death. It embraces passion, humanity, religion, nature, greed, pathos, and a liberal dose of reality. It is a "must" read for all those concerned about the relationship between human beings and nature, and among human beings. Two excerpts: "On the day of the hunt I came to know in the slick center of my bones this one thing: all animals kill to survive, and we are animals. The lion kills the baboon; the baboon kills fat grasshoppers. The elephant rears up living trees, dragging their precious roots from the dirt they love. The hungry antelope's shadow passes over the startled grass. And we, even if we had no meat or even grass to gnaw, still boil our water to kill the invisible creatures that would like to kill us first. And swallow quinine pills. The death of something living is the price of our own survival, and we pay it again and again. We have no choice. It is the one solemn promise every life on earth is born and bound to keep." [Page 347] "Africa has a thousand ways of cleansing itself. Driver ants, Ebola virus, acquired immune deficiency syndrome: all these are brooms devised by nature to sweep a small clearing very well. Not one of them can cross a river by itself. And none can survive past the death of its host. A parasite of humans that extinguished us altogether, you see, would quickly be laid to rest in human graves." [Page 529] The final five pages are sheer poetry, and must be read only after embracing the entire work.
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Summary: A hidden treasure of a book!
Review: My friends kept telling me to read this book, and I finally did. In the beginning, the story was slow as each daughter took turns telling the story of living with their strict father and weak mother in the Congo. But that doesn't mean it isn't good. But once the family began to leave the Congo, boy, was I compelled!! I could NOT put down the book!! I'm a college student, and the book was on my mind during classes! I have never read anything like this - the Congo is described in great detail, as if it was told from an African living there. But no, a plain regular white woman wrote this! I actually felt like flying out there and seeing it for myself. It is also as if Kingsolver was actually there with the family as well! The title doesn't seem much but you know the famous quote: "Never judge a book by its cover." This is the perfect book to go with that quote! IT IS A MUST-READ FOR EVERYONE!!!
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Summary: THE FINEST POETIC PROSE I'VE SEEN IN EONS
Review: The real mystery about this book is how it ever got published in this day and age, much less make it on Oprah!?!-I have suspicions that some cheering Ms. Kingsolver on haven't read much of her writing.-It's too good to be so popular! The last American novel this poetic and difficult for those not attuned to the music of words that made it big and, in fact, bears a certain resemblence to Ms. Kingsolver's work is The Sound and The Fury, by none other than Willy Faulkner. There are echoes of other works as well. One reviewer has already mentioned The Mosquito Coast by Theroux. There's also the short story "Rain" by W.S. Maugham. Even though Kingsolver has her characters actually mention The Heart of Darkness in the book, the themes are so different that I don't think there's much of a comparison between the works. Conrad's work is focussed so exclusively on Man, Kurtz or Marlowe, while Kingsolver takes in everything under the sun and moon and stars.-But let me return, how can any book that has quotes like this from the deformed genius Adah (much resembling the clairvoyant Benji in The Sound and The Fury) be so popular!?! "Presentiment-is that long Shadow-on the Lawn- Indicative that Suns go down- The Notice to the startled Grass That Darkness-is about to pass- Pity the poor dumb startled grass, I do. Ssap ot tuoba. I am fond of Miss Emily Dickinson: No snikcidy lime, a contrary name with a sourgreen taste. Reading her secrets and poite small cruelties of her heart, I believe she enjoyed taking the dumb grass by surprise in her poem...she makes small scratching sounds with her pen, covering with nightfall all creatures that really should know what to expect by now, but don't..." The book is chock-full of philosophical and poetic reflections of this sort. But I don't see people rushing out to buy new copies of Miss Dickinson's poetry, or books of palindromes for that matter!----Oh, Never mind how such a delightful book gained popularity and publication....Let us be thankful!
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