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Summary: --
Review: "Imagine a ruin so strange it must never have happened" -- so begins Barbara Kingsolver's immense and wonderful Poisonwood Bible. Ms. Kingsolver has said that "Your first sentence should make a promise that the rest of the [work] keeps." She keeps her promise. I can not say enough good things about this book. Ms. Kingsolver has given us a book that buries itself inside your humanity and vibrates there long after you've finished. Simply, this one will make you a better person.
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Summary: Interesting From Start to Finish
Review: This is a book I never would have taken off the library shelf except that it was chosen for our book discusion gruop....and am I glad! I had a difficult time putting it down as I waited anxiously to see what was going to happen next. I am glad I was unable to obtain the book from my library as I might have had difficulty reading it with all the forgein names and wording. The book on tape made it quite easy to grasp as it is spoken well and all the characters had a different voice inflection. In spite of a few times being confused with who was speaking I was absolutly mesmerized. I found myself asking the same questions.."Where was I when when all this was happening?" While they were busy gathering wood and boiling water all day, I was busy with raising my own brood and had my own distractions. I recognized names but was not familar with the history. This was an eye opening history lesson for me even though it was a work of fiction. It is obvious the author put in a great deal of reaserch. A must read or a must listen.
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Summary: I felt like I was on a journey
Review: This book was often hard to get through because of the cruelty of the father, Baptist missionary Nathan Price. But by the end of the book, I felt as though I had been devastated and then rebuilt, like the Price family and like the Congo itself. I felt like I had been somewhere I had never been. I also began feeling incredibly grateful for things I take for granted every day--food, clothing, shelter, doctors, etc. I thought about this book, its characters, and the ramifications of their actions, for days after I finished it. It's not for everyone, but I hope you try it out anyway. It just might affect you profoundly.
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Summary: The Emperor's New Clothes Leads to Much Applause!
Review: I found Kingsolver's book oppressive --- The characters were caricatures who each had their own signature idiosyncrasies which did not make up for lack of true character development (or the lack of chronological maturity one would expect by the end of the book.) The "christians" in this book are no more christians than I am Barbara Kingsolver. I understood very clearly the point Kingsolver was trying to make, and though I believe she was accurate in her description of the political and social currents in the Congo, I felt like she got wedged and unable to proceed past the obvious injustice inflicted on the Congo (of which, by the way, I am not trying to make light of). Kingsolver seemed pompous and arrogant not only in her expression --- but in her fundamental belief system. She has a light view of God --- and misrepresents God to the finest detail. God becomes the ultimate caricature. The book was devoid of genuine truth and hope. What do I mean when I say that? ...That though there are many seemingly unaccounted for, unutterable pains in life, God's arm is neither shortened, nor are His plans or the extent of His sovereignty.
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Summary: Me and my mom both loved it
Review: When my mom gave me this book to read, I wasn't interested at first. But once I started reading it pulled me in. I am 14 and could relate to the trials and tribulations of the four Price daughters. It really made me thankful for the easy life I lead and it opened my eyes to the problems and poor conditions that so many of the world's citizens must live with. Not only did I learn about some of the excesses of our society, I also got an in-depth history lesson on the shoddy decolonization of Africa and the situations that occured because of it.
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Summary: The Eyes in the Trees
Review: One is alternately frustrated, angry, and amused at the antics of the remarkably rigid evangelical Baptist missionary Nathan Price. His story, the story of the Congo, and his family's stories are told in turn by his wife and daughters. In the end, Africa transforms not only the meager possessions that the Price family brought to the Congo, but each of the family members themselves.Nathan and his unforgiving, uncompromising, and uncomprehending brand of religion only survives as long as he does because of the quiet compassion of the villagers in Kilanga. In the end, he changes nothing of significance there and winds up being killed because of his religion induced blindness. His life story is a clear warning for those who in their smug self-righteousness do not allow for the fact that we could all be wrong in our belief systems. Orleanna Price, wife, mother, and survivor. It is she who holds the family together as best she can and shelters them from the tyrant father. She never does accept Africa as her own, but cannot escape its influence. Through tragedy, she grows to understand the mistaken attempts to save those poor souls in Africa, who in then end need no outside saviors. Rachel Price, is the oldest daughter and self-centered teenage product of the relatively affluent America. Her major concern is for her own looks and getting out of Africa to go back to her parties and easy life. She too is a survivor. But, as luck would have it, winds up staying in Africa and becoming a successful businesswoman. She never does understand her younger twin sisters who are both more observant and intellectually competent than Rachel will ever be. Leah Price is the "normal" twin, ever guilty for perhaps causing her sister to be crippled, and ever on the watch to please father. Yet it is she who grows independent enough to actually stand up to the tyrant. It is she who becomes the tomboy and feminist of the Price women. It is she who comes to love Africa and Anatole (her African husband and father of her children), and it is she who chooses to stay and help the people in any way she can. Adah Price is Leah's crippled twin and, like Leah, intelligent beyond her years. She suffers from hemiplegia, which seems to give her special insight into the way things are. She takes comfort in her own silence and uses her affliction to the best advantage. Adah is my favorite character because of her clear understanding of her father, their plight, the lives of the people of Kilanga, and where she fits in the world. Her understanding is not perfect, but it grows in time as she observes more in her own backward/forward way. Adah overcomes her hemiplegia and eventually becomes a successful biomedical researcher. Ruth May Price is the baby of the family. She is a wonderful, prescient child who is the first to make friends with the children of Kilanga. She is headstrong, persistent, and constantly pushing the limits. In the end, it is she who suffers not only from her own actions, but from the unforgiving Congo. Thus the Price family represents a cross-section of America in foreign affairs. Nathan is the self-righteousness of a rich and successful people who cannot see the virtues of a different culture and who recklessly impose unworkable solutions to perceived problems. Orleanna is the compliant "my country right or wrong" patriot of the masses who only rebels when it is perhaps too late. Rachel is the spoiled middle-class caring only about achieving and maintaining a comfortable life regardless of the world consequences. Adah represents the best intentions of our technology to bring relief to a suffering world, but still at arms length. Leah stands in for those who, out of guilt and recognition of wrong doing, actually try to bring about small steps on the path to progress that fit the culture of the wronged. And Ruth May is like all those innocent children who are harmed from neglect or misguided adults in pursuit of their selfish adult goals. And in the weaving of the Price family story, we learn a great deal about the Congo's fight for independence from Belgium. As each of the women tell their stories, in their own words, misspellings, and prejudices, the characters of the other family members and friends becomes a bit more complete, along with the story of the struggle of a people yearning to be free from foreign rule. The journey matters, and Barbara Kingsolver takes us on a compelling journey in The Poisonwood Bible. I enjoyed this book even more on my second reading.
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Summary: Eye opening read
Review: This story was difficult for me to get started. I did not enjoy the first 140 some pages but suddenly I was pulled in and could not wait to read the next page and the next. This story of a missionary family in the Congo during its change to Zaire was told through the voices of the family members, which means everything that happens could be viewed differently. Same occurences, same result, different interpretation. The discussions of the cultural differences are amazing and frank. They make you take a second look at our culture of excess, and at one's opinion of what poverty really is. This is a very eye opening book, and well worth the read.
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Summary: Mesmerizing, complex: a different Kingsolver, but worthwhile
Review: The first thing most any Kingsolver fan (as I am) usually says about the Poisonwood Bible is "It's different from the others." But don't dismiss it for that, or you will be losing out on a profound read.. Kingsolver's other books had a unifiedness: they pretty much revolved around the Southwest, were often about single moms, and were in the comfy 300-ish page range. In contrast, Poisonwood Bible is set in Africa, and is of epic length and scope. A rich, textured, challenging book, the story is about a heavy-handed Baptist missionary who takes his wife and family of four girls to be missionaries in the Belgion Congo in 1960, the period of the Congo's unanticipated independence. In her author's foreword, Kingsolver tells us that she too was taken to the Congo as a child, although her parents were health providers, not missionaries, and "different in every way" from the Poisonwood parents. Like a movie camera slowly circling its actors, Poisonwood's point of view is passed off from one narrator to another, a technique going back to William Faulker's Sound and the Fury (and perhaps elsewhere), and which I've been noticing has been in vogue lately. Sometimes we're seeing from the first person eyes of the spunky youngest girl; sometimes the poetic obstruse and otherworldly handicapped twin; sometimes the Ugly American oldest girl, her voice simultaneously appalling and engaging. Parts hypnotic, parts historical, parts beautifully psychological. By the end of the 543-page tome, I really felt as though I'd climbed inside the psyche of this family. And perhaps most importantly, I definitely feel I've a better sense of and sympathy for Africa than I did before. This book has taken several very American vantage points into Africa, and as the young protagonists grow and learn about this country and culture so hidden and misperceived by *this* country and culture, so too do we readers. I definitely recommended this mesmerizing novel.
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Summary: An Engrossing Epic
Review: Rich imagery, leafy, green and lush. I've never been to Africa but feel like I've experienced life in the Congo - the colorful clothing, the manioc fields, the unrelenting rainy seasons, a society where you give what you can to your neighbors, where deformities and scars are seen as beauty marks. The novel is not without it's flaws, as the other readers have pointed out, but if you're in the mood for something different, I reccomend THE POISONWOOD BIBLE. The struggle this family had to endure as outsiders in deepest, darkest Africa was a truly engrossing story, and the different perspectives of each of the daughters and their mother made it that much more captivating. I felt as if I really got to know them and wanted to know what happened to them, which is why I'm glad the book didn't end when they left the Congo.
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Summary: Just read the WORDS
Review: I enjoyed this book more for the language than the story. Not to say the tale wasn't interesting, and for me, knowing little of the Congolese history, it was gripping. But other things were even more interesting. I was really fascinated by Kingsolver's picture of what it was like inside Adah's head (daeh's hada!)and her unique use of language. The different voices maintained my interest in the story throughout, and unlike many others who've reviewed the book I found the characters quite realistic and convincing. The one character I felt was less than sufficiently deep was the mother. I wanted to sympathize with her, but found her too insipid to get involved with. Nevertheless, a jolly good read, and educational too. (Political freaks take note, this is a novel, not a textbook. Literary freaks take note, this is a popular novel, not a pivotal literary masterpiece.)
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