Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver

 I have read this book multiple times because I enjoy it so much. Each time I find new clues that foreshadow events coming up. There are delightful little nuances that crop up as I read slowly and carefully. Kingsolver's prose and characters are worth savoring. Now that I know the story so well, I can read slowly and not be impatient to know what happens next. 

I can't believe I haven't written about this book here before. It's definitely one of my top ten favorites of all time... I love the characters, I love the setting, I love the story, and I love how the characters evolve and change as the story unfolds. I have read it at least five times now, and enjoyed it again earlier this summer.

There's such a reverence for life here and much to admire as the characters face adversity. I am saddened every time I note the slight bitterness in Nanny's feelings about her daughter's birth defect and death. She is a practical woman who brings such goodness into the world, but will not acknowledge God's hand or existence. Deanna and Luza are also fascinating characters with colorful backgrounds that are slowly revealed. I love learning about nature through their conversations and thoughts, and I love the thought of the two of them becoming friends in the future; something only hinted at in this book. This is one of those nuances that I only noticed on the second reading.

The wicked sisters in law and Garrett are also great characters, and their development is also realistic and revealing. The author goes beyond the stereotypes to reveal the pain, the suffering, and the goodness that exists.

I also believe in the healing powers of nature and this book is a beautiful example of the many complex systems in nature and how one cog in the system affects other parts. It ought to be required reading for any aspiring farmer or biologist.

Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver

Kingsolver is one of my favorite authors. My sister Ann recommended this one, which surprisingly I hadn't yet read. Her book club read it and she thought I would enjoy it. I did!

As usual, Kingsolver's characters are fascinating and their conversations make me chuckle. Her metaphors are AMAZING and often stop me in my tracks. I loved how the story unfolded and how Dellarobia Turnbow's character developed over the year of the story. It was a delightful read, even though the subject was a hard one...a marriage ending and climate change!

The science instruction inherent in any Kingsolver book is a gift to me. (Prodigal Summer comes to mind, in particular.) Weaving science into the story makes it much easier for me to understand and be interested. I appreciate the education!

Now here's the part that I found disappointing... This marriage and family is struggling. It's heart breaking to watch, yet so understandable! Dellarobia's thinking is such that any woman could relate--and her love of her children is clear and palpable. Her experiences in church and with her in-laws are all intriguing, often funny, and often heart-breaking. I was hoping throughout the whole story that Dellarobia would find a way to make it all work without divorce. That she did not, was disappointing.

I know many would cite irreconcilable differences, but I would not. Her husband Cub has a good heart, which she recognizes. They've already overcome so many challenges! She doesn't see a way to be a leader or have more patience with her situation or somehow make it work. That was disappointing because it could have been a road map for a different way of thinking and acting... This view of "finding ourselves" and putting ourselves first in a selfish way is the way of our current culture. There's a better way...See the excerpt from Yearning for the Living God by F. Enzio Busche that I added at the end of my reflection. That's an example of how different thinking might have helped this marriage succeed.

And let me say right here...it's easy to blame one's partner. But as I have learned from life, and first from C. Terry Warner, that when you give a (difficult or unlikeable) person a different kind of person to respond to, they change! In other words, YOU change, and the other person does too, in response, because you are giving that person a different person to respond to. My explanation is clumsy, but I know it's a true principle! It even works with children--and if you think about it and experiment with it, you will see that I am right! It's a wonderful, powerful principle because YOU have the power to change...and hence the situation does too.

Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver

I gave Melissa Prodigal Summer for Christmas 2010, which she loved. I hoped she would! I read it about every other summer and enjoy it every time. This book set Melissa on a path of other Kingsolver work. So, she asked me if I would be interested in borrowing Lacuna when she was done with it. "Yes!" I said, enthusiastically. I eagerly started in...and, surprisingly, found it hard-going. It was hard on several levels. First of all, I wasn't sure I understood what was going on. The structure was hard to figure out. And what in the heck did "VB" mean? The sentences were short, yet very descriptive. It wasn't at all the usual lyrical Kingsolver I was used to. And yet occasionally, there were glimpses of insights that were powerful. So I soldiered on.

About two weeks after she lent it to me, Lu asked how I liked it. I said I found it kind of depressing! I didn't enjoy the setting at all, found it all a little cryptic, and was surprised at how I wasn't loving it. I was determined to stay with it, though, and she agreed I should. She liked the setting...the craziness of Mexico and life with Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera...I found it weird and couldn't relate at all. I was half-way through the book and still wondered if I would ever like it.

Then, about the time Violet Brown entered the scene, it all changed for me. The descriptions came alive and I fell in love with the characters. Something about Harrison Shepherd had grown on me...his utter humility and poverty of advantages. The second half of the book, I savored. Since most of it is written in Shepherd's voice, it was dawning on me how "his" writing and personality were developing over the course of the novel. I marveled at Kingsolver's subtlety! I also grew to love and appreciate the characters of Kahlo and Trotsky. Amazing how these are portrayed and would often cause me to laugh out loud or shed tears. The conversations were truly wonderful to read. It also makes me want to study Rivera's and Kahlo's art...

Other amazing things about this book are the way she teaches history...the level of detail and research that went into this are incredible. And how did she capture the mind and heart of a gay man in such a sympathetic, understanding, and heart-wrenching way? And how did she ever capture the patter of Tom Cuddy, the hep cat??? The closing years of this epic overlap with the year of my birth. It's crazy to read of the political realities that were extant in that era--the witch-hunting of Communists. Kingsolver brings this despicable chapter in our history into reality in a very painful way. Americans being unamerican and all that meant. I will definitely reread this book, and probably enjoy the first half more, now that I know what is going on. The structure is so unique...part diary, part letters, part editor additions...

A sampling:
Violet Brown: "It's true I lost a husband in the flood of the French Broad River in '16, Freddy Brown, and that broke a young girl's heart. But this was worse. My heart had grown older, with more in it to break. I can't put words to that afternoon. He would know words for the feelings I bore, but I only knew the feelings."

"Memories do not always soften with time; some grow edges like knives."

There is a whole deeper level of understanding one would get from the humor and pathos if one understood Spanish. There's plenty in the book; not all of it translated. That is a layer that eludes me. An evocative book. 
Read in February 2011