Review of Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver

Pigs in Heaven was chosen by Fe. The evening was hosted by D. This meeting was the last bookclub (other than the end of year dinner) to be attended by ArmyWife before she moves interstate next year.

Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver was published in 1993 as a sequel to her first novel The Bean Trees. While The Bean Trees was written in the first person this novel was written in an omniscient voice.

The novel was set in Kentucky, Arizona and Oklahoma. Kingsolver was born in eastern Kentucky in 1955 but moved to Indiana for her tertiary education. While at university Kingsolver became active in the anti-Vietnam movement and from there became a political and social activist.

Kingsolver's novels draw upon her social and political beliefs and she starts each novel with a question in her mind. The question in this book was "Can the needs of the community and the needs of the individual be reconciled?".

The setting for this question is the social position of Native America and whether a Native American tribe can have a child returned after she has been adopted by a non-native family. Kingsolver asks us to consider the needs of the Native American community to protect and promote its culture by bringing up all its children with the tribe as well as the benefits to the child of living with a non-native family.

This book provoked rigorous discussion about the situation posed in the book and we discussed whether parallels could be drawn with issues facing Aboriginal Australia. This made it a very interesting book to read in the light of Carpentaria which was read last month.

The ambiguity of the novel's central question is reinforced by placing all characters from the adoptive mother and her family to the Native American community in a low socio-economic band. The child (Turtle's) adoptive mother is fiercely protective and loving and yet struggles to care for her. Meanwhile the community, represented by lawyer & tribe member Annawake, is also fiercely protective of their tribe and yet struggles to keep it together.

All the characters in the book portray different ways of showing love as the novel works towards its very tidy movie-like ending.

Members agreed that the novel was generally agreeable but that perhaps the ending was a little too 'movie-like' and gave an average rating of 7.5

In other news

• As it was ArmyWife's last official bookclub meeting before her departure interstate we took commemorative photos.


• We confirmed that our annual end-of-year bookclub dinner will be at the fabulous new Ripples at Chowder Bay in December.


• The highlight of the food part of the evening was D bringing out tea and coffee using her beautiful vintage china.

October Book: Carpentaria by Alexis Wright

Review by L

I chose Carpentaria, 'sight unread' as such, as I felt that it would be a good choice to read the winner of the Miles Franklin Literary award for 2007.

Caprentaria is a story about an Aboriginal community set in the fictional town of Desperance on the Gulf of Carpentaria. Desperance is made up of four groups of people co-existing: the Westside mob who live on the edge of the rubbish dump, the Eastside mob who claim to be the traditional land owners, the Uptown people who are the whites and the Pricklebush people who are the 'old people'.

Central to the book are issues of land rights and mining as well as a host of social issues affecting Aboriginal people and how the four groups interact as well as their different belief systems. Wright explains that a central concern was 'How do you mend the broken line - the effect of colonisation?'

When I started reading Carpentaria I began to regret my choice. This was echoed by the grumblings from other Book Club members. The book is difficult to penetrate and requires real effort. However, the consensus of those who persevered was that it was well worth the effort. Wright says herself she expects her readers to work.

The story is told in a narrative style in the language of an Aboriginal elder. You soon realise although very descriptive, in the words of our 'linguist' club member, every word is there for a reason, nothing is superfluous. Wright did attempt to write the story in a more conventional style but felt it didn't strike the right tone.

The characters in the book give the story the depth to expose the serious social issues up for discussion,  with an added humorous slant to elicit some chuckles.  The three generations of female characters are almost 'extras' while the male characters are more extraordinary.  The story centers around the lives of  Norm Phantom and his family (Westend Pricklebush people) and their battles with the Eastend mob led by Joseph Midnight against a backdrop of struggles with the white officials of Uptown and Gurfurrit mine.

During our discussion, four members who were not raised in Australia quizzed the others as to details of the background of Aboriginal affairs in Australia. This highlighted how little direct exposure the rest of us have had to Aboriginal people although very much a current affairs topic.

The range of scores from the five members of our Book Club who finished and rated the book were:  9 highest and 7.5 lowest with an average of 8.1.  After our discussion several of the members who were there,  and had not persevered,  did commit to giving it another go.  I hope they do.

November book: Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver

Our November read is Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver. This book has been chosen by Fe. This book will be discussed on Monday 12th November at 8pm. Location for this discussion is TBA.

Review: Time Traveller's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, published by MacAdam/Cage in 2003.








I stumbled across this book in a very round about way (thanks to my friend Julia!) - which was lucky since the publisher's review, whilst enthusiastic in its praise, probably would not have tempted me. We reviewed the book at bookclub on 10 September 2007. Here's the quote:

" A dazzling novel in the most untraditional fashion, this is the remarkable story of Henry deTamble, a dashing, adventuresome librarian who travels involuntarily through time, and Clare Abshire, an artist whose life takes a natural sequential course. Henry and Clare's passionate love affair endures across a sea of time and captures the two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap, and it is Audrey Niffenegger's cinematic storytelling that makes the novel's unconventional chronology so vibrantly triumphant" Hmmm.

What can you say about a book that's more than a love story, that dabbles in science fiction and time travel without becoming too fantastic, that celebrates and explores relationships without becoming sentimental, that makes you feel you could know these people and go to the places they go to? (which, in fact one could, as the geography of the novel is very real and embraces Chicago like an old friend).

Without going into the details of the plot too much, The Time Traveler's Wife chronicles the extraordinary relationship of Henry and Clare over their lives, starting from when Clare is six and Henry is 36 through to Clare's old age. From the beginning the reader is drawn into their lives and their future lives. The dual narrative voices of Henry and Clare allow the reader to be privy to parts of Clare's life (by virtue of Henry's time travel) that Clare has not reached yet. There's an intimacy is knowing what Clare doesn't know and an expectant thrill in looking forward to getting to where Henry is. It's not always a comfortable journey. Like (real) life, it's punctuated by the unexpected, the bad, the sad and the glorious, but it still retains a fairy tale quality - which incidentally, was part of the attraction for me!

The Time Traveller's Wife was Audrey Niffenegger's first novel. It took about four and a half years from conception to finished manuscript and was rejected by about 20 publishers before being accepted by MacAdam Page (which paid out, incidentally, the largest advance they've ever given for a first novel). As Ms Niffenegger says, she "didn't have to worry too much about how long it ... nobody cares if you're done ... you don't really have anyone to impress yet"

It's an accessible, fantastic read, a carefully crafted book with much to recommend it, even if you're not a fan of romantic or science fiction - which I'm not. Look beyond the "labels" and just jump in. You won't be disappointed. We weren't.

Incidentally, the book is being made into a film scheduled for release next year - it will be interesting to see how it stands up to the test! Here's the link: http://http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0452694/

October Book: Carpentaria by Alexis Wright

Our book for October is the Miles Franklin Award-winning novel Carpentaria by Alexis Wright.

This is LJ's choice and the discussion will be held at KM's house on Monday 15 October at 8pm

Man Booker Prize Shortlist Announced

The Man Booker Prize shortlist was announced in London today. For more details check out the press release.

The Shortlist:

Darkmans by Nicola Barker (Fourth Estate)
The Gathering by Anne Enright (Jonathan Cape)
The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid (Hamish Hamilton)
Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones (John Murray)
On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan (Jonathan Cape)
Animal’s People by Indra Sinha (Simon & Schuster)

The Worry Tree

Does your child come home from school with "big issues" from the playground? Is your child a natural born worrier?

Sharyn from Pretty Essential recently bought The Worry Tree by Marianne Musgrove for her 8yo daughter and she loved it. It sounds like a beautiful book.

Read her review here.

UPDATE 4 September 2007: I bought this for my 9yo daughter yesterday. She couldn't put it down (reading during dinner, late at night, during breakfast) and has declared it her favourite ever book.