A review by booklywookly
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

4.0

The story begins with a white missionary, Nathan Price, bringing his family - his wife and their 4 daughters - to the village of Kilanga, Congo from Georgia, USA. His mission? To spread the humble word of Lord Jesus in the village. To baptise every African kid there. To open the eyes these heathens against worshiping their false gods. To save them from being eternally damned in the hurtful fires of the beyond. What could go wrong.

Congo, meanwhile, is gearing up for a post colonial transformation of its own. And soon enough the family realises, the villagers with their hunger and poverty ain’t got no time for Independence and Jesus. 

Told from the PoV of the four daughters and their mother, this was for the bulk of it, a magnificent read. I might even call it a coming-of-age of a whole family in the face of adversity. They sashayed into the jungle aiming to change it all over to the Christian style. The jungle changed them right back. 

But…

It did lose me at the end, and reinforced my bias against the author. Despite this being my first Kingsolver, I somehow already had this image of the author as a very self righteous and a self important person, and the last couple of chapters in The Poisonwood Bible where Mama Kingsolver suddenly becomes an Africa expert (and a spokesperson, very cringe-worthy so), gave me the glimpse of it. The reason why I couldn’t, and still can’t, get my self to pick Demon Copperhead. (I am sorry, Kingsolver fans! I can’t help it, forgive me)

Still, an absolutely brilliant book. This reminded me of Kibogo. It also reminded me of Lonesome Dove. Don’t ask how, but it just did. A bit of Tomb of Sand even. 

But most importantly, it reminded me of Sharks In The Time of Saviours, which dare I say is a more beautiful and poetic version of The Poisonwood Bible (Here I am again, shamelessly reminding you to read that book, if you haven’t yet)