The Poisonwood Bible is a story told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it—from garden seeds to Scripture—is calamitously transformed on African soil. What follows is a suspenseful epic of one … epic of one family’s tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa.
The novel is set against one of the most dramatic political chronicles of the twentieth century: the Congo’s fight for independence from Belgium, the murder of its first elected prime minister, the CIA coup to install his replacement, and the insidious progress of a world economic order that robs the fledgling African nation of its autonomy. Against this backdrop, Orleanna Price reconstructs the story of her evangelist husband’s part in the Western assault on Africa, a tale indelibly darkened by her own losses and unanswerable questions about her own culpability. Also narrating the story, by turns, are her four daughters—the self-centered, teenaged Rachel; shrewd adolescent twins Leah and Adah; and Ruth May, a prescient five-year-old. These sharply observant girls, who arrive in the Congo with racial preconceptions forged in 1950s Georgia, will be marked in surprisingly different ways by their father’s intractable mission, and by Africa itself. Ultimately each must strike her own separate path to salvation. Their passionately intertwined stories become a compelling exploration of moral risk and personal responsibility.
Dancing between the dark comedy of human failings and the breathtaking possibilities of human hope, The Poisonwood Bible possesses all that has distinguished Barbara Kingsolver’s previous work, and extends this beloved writer’s vision to an entirely new level. Taking its place alongside the classic works of postcolonial literature, this ambitious novel establishes Kingsolver as one of the most thoughtful and daring of modern writers.
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This is one of my all time favorite books.
One of my all-time favorite books! Fascinating story about subject matter I knew little about.
Really enjoyed this book
One of the best books I’ve ever read.
Loved this complex weaving. Cried at the end.
A competitor fot the Great American Novel, except it is set in Congo around the 1960s.
I didn’t like this book because I am tired of egocentric men who think they are always right but actually create havoc in the lives of others. I did read the entire book, though, as it did pull me in.
One of my all-time favorite books. I re-read it after a couple of years and found it even more stirring the second time around. Great author.
Not a huge fan of this book. I didn’t care for the characters or the story.
A wonderful read….highly recommend it…..one of my all time favorites
I read this book years ago. Very descriptive situations,and characters. I found the ending unusual. I did not understand it.
This book is my favorite at the moment. Kingsolver floored me with her attention to detail and nuance in both her world building and character development. Her arcs were perfection but so was her line-by-line prose. This is one of those books that is so filled with insight you have to stop and gasp and take a picture of the words on the page. A …
Good writing, but I can’t say I enjyed it.
My all time favorite of Kingsolver’s books.
This book was so well done I read it twice!
This book continues to stay in my mind long after I read it. The poor girls and mom living in the amazon and how it all turned out. Good read.
This is one of my favorite books. Loved it.
Wonderfully well written.
Have read it twice. Understood much better second time, while reading with my high-school age granddaughter. We had some great discussions!
This one is a favorite
One of my all-time favorites.