Angela's Reviews > The Poisonwood Bible

I read this ten years ago and fell in love with it. I reread or rather listened to it on audible and I enjoyed it even more. Kingsolver is one of my favorite authors and this book is my favorite of all her books. I read that it took her a decade to write and her perseverance paid off. The story is about the Price family, who leave their home in small-town Georgia for Africa's Congo at the end of Belgian rule in 1959. The father, a Baptist Minister, feels called to bring the dark souls of Africa to God and his patient wife and four daughters embark on a journey that will change their family forever.

The story is told by the wife, Orleanna, and her four daughters. Rachel, the oldest, is shallow and self-absorbed, wondering what she will do when her Breck shampoo runs. Leah is idealistic and eager to please. Leah's twin, detaches herself from the family, hiding behind her crooked body and the youngest, Ruth May, is the most courageous of all. She's the first to make friends with the Congolese children in their village. Orleanna, the mother, narrates from the future, and her memories are full of guilt and regret for what has happened to her family.

As tensions mount in their Congolese village, they become metaphors of the changes in the Congo as it struggles for independence. The Price family has been asked to leave, but Reverand Price refuses, as he feels he still has more of God's work to do. His stubbornness turns to fanaticism and it's the undoing of his family.

Some of the daughters remain in Africa for the rest of their lives and other return to America, but all are forever changed by their time in the village of Kilanga.