READ THIS! {Updates & Reviews}

As June is already halfway through (really, where is the time going?), it's time to showcase our READ THIS! book of the month, The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver.

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This novel, while certainly not a light read, is an incredibly story that takes the reader on a truly inspiring journey. I am not quite finished with it yet, but I am eager to finish reading this novel and to discover where it takes me. The novel was mostly very well received, winning the Boeke Prize in 2000 and nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in 1999. Here are some of the reviews:



Vyrlen Klinkenborg of the NYTimes writes, "''The Poisonwood Bible'' thus belongs to the women, and it is a story about the loss of one faith and the discovery of another, for each woman according to her kind. [...] The Congo permeates ''The Poisonwood Bible,'' and yet this is a novel that is just as much about America, a portrait, in absentia, of the nation that sent the Prices to save the souls of a people for whom it felt only contempt, people who already, in the words of a more experienced missionary, ''have a world of God's grace in their lives, along with a dose of hardship that can kill a person entirely.'' The Congolese are not savages who need saving, the Price women find, and there is nothing passive in their tolerance of missionaries. [...] And yet, for all its portraiture of place, its reflexive political vitriol, its passionate condemnation of Nathan Price, ''The Poisonwood Bible'' is ultimately a novel of character, a narrative shaped by keen-eyed women contemplating themselves and one another and a village whose familiarity it takes a tragedy to discover." Ron Charles, for the Christian Science Monitor, writes, "In her newest novel, Barbara Kingsolver takes the kind of artistic risks only a beginner - or a genius - would dare take.There are problems in this big book, but I once knew a ceramics teacher who told his students, 'A perfectly centered pot is a dead pot.' Despite its uneven quality, The Poisonwood Bible is a vessel that holds our attention and some powerful ideas." And finally, People reviewed it, noting, "There is more at stake than linguistic confusion in this beautifully written new novel by Barbara Kingsolver[.] [...] Kingsolver's tale of domestic tragedy is more than just a well-told yarn, however. Played out against the bloody backdrop of political struggles in Congo that continue to this day, it is also particularly timely."
Have you been reading along with us? Have you read this before and thinking of picking it up to read again? Are you intrigued by these reviews? I'd love to hear from you!