Book: Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver
I had high expectations for this one and accordingly, the first chapter left me in shock. Am I reading Twilight? How can I be drowning in a sea of schmaltz and cheese? Is the rest of the book like this?
Fortunately, no.
As a novel, Prodigal Summer
Each strand focuses on a natural element (coyotes, moths, chestnut trees) and a main character. Kingsolver shows how each is a part of the world at large. By now, we should all be familiar with food webs and the interlocking dependencies of any ecosystem but what’s impressive is Kingsolver’s ability to demonstrate the dependencies and interrelatedness of the human world both as an extension of and as a mirroring parallel to the natural world.
Just as animals and plants do not live in isolation, neither do people and their communities. At the beginning of the book, the three main protagonists are all isolated in their own ways. Their isolations are the results of their own choices and states of mind—whether they realize it or not.
As the novel progresses, they start to see their connections and we, the readers, are able to see an even greater part.
The way the structure of the novel reflects the personal journeys of each character, which go on to reflect the larger overall theme, is impressive. It shows great skill, and I appreciate that it is not heavy handed in its presentation.
My one criticism is that the problems faced by each strand’s characters are revisited and verbalized too often. We don’t need to be told in every dozen pages things that have been assuredly well established.
Because there isn’t enough variety, I think the resolution to each storyline is too slow in coming. Each tale could have progressed more quickly and in fewer chapters.
But in a way, the pace of the work also takes its cue from the natural world that Kingsolver wants us to notice. Her descriptions are rich and beautiful.
After reading a whole bunch of twentieth-century minimalist novels like Wittgenstein’s Nephew and Junky, this was a shock to the system.
The novel is going to move and change at its own pace. It’s going to go through repetitive cycles. The reader is just going to have to sit back and enjoy what’s in front of him/her because short of artificial modifications, there really isn’t much to be done.
No, Kingsolver probably didn’t intend for this effect, but this is something I got out of the overall reading experience.
New Author Challenge: one completed, fourteen to go.
[...] connection aside, I really enjoyed the book. By coincidence, I just finished Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver right before starting Potato Branch. While Potato Branch does not have the sweeping themes of [...]