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Pigs in Heaven Barbara Kingsolver 9780571171781 Books

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Pigs in Heaven Barbara Kingsolver 9780571171781 Books

This book is a follow up to the wonderful "The Bean Tree" where we meet one of the most interesting heroines of modern fiction, Taylor and the baby she "accidentally" adopts. In this novel we learn about the gripping events that come from that accidental adoption and how Taylor learns to face her fears and find the courage to not only stand up to official interference but to accept the love of a good man.. No one can write about women's emotions and fears like Barbara Kingsolver, told around events that are so exciting that one does not want to put the book down. And no one can describe the amazing landscape of western America as well as Kingsolver. A must read.


Tags : Pigs in Heaven [Barbara Kingsolver] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Continuing the story begun in The Bean Trees, this novel features the characters Taylor and Turtle as they witness an event whose repercussions will change their lives forever. By the author of Animal Dreams and Homeland .,Barbara Kingsolver,Pigs in Heaven,Faber & Faber Ltd,0571171788,Modern fiction,Fiction

Pigs in Heaven Barbara Kingsolver 9780571171781 Books Reviews

This book negotiates the issues of identity, belonging, heritage and culture with great sensitivity. Because all of this applies to a child, for whom decisions will be made that will dictate a future, the concern becomes the universal parent/guardian dilemma. When you, as the adult, make formative choices for someone who is not yet able to manage his/her life, how do you know that what you are choosing is the right thing for the child? Is love enough? Or is love an excuse for one's choices to be consistent with one's own needs? By the same token is basing one's choices on a moral imperative an objective 'right' thing to do, or is it merely a formula to be followed that makes oneself safe - but not necessarily the child?
The conflict is presented and followed through in a way that is sound guidance for the reader go with the love, but don't stop asking yourself why you why you make the decisions that you do.
I have read most of Barbara Kingsolver’s novels, including her most recent, Flight Behavior, and the beginnings of the Taylor Greer story, contained in the novel The Bean Trees. I always like the author’s easy, unpretentious, humorous style, which does not at all conceal her artistic flair for poetic images and her common-sense understanding of human beings – good and bad. Flight Behavior continues the story in which Taylor Greer became a “foster mother” to a three year-old Cherokee Indian girl, whom she names Turtle, because the girl holds her hand so tightly that, like a snapping turtle, she won’t let go “until she hears thunder.” Turtle was abused by her mother’s boyfriend, both sexually and physically, orphaned by her mother’s suicide, and abandoned by her mother’s sister (who gave the child to Taylor at a restaurant to keep the girl from more harm). Taylor was travelling cross-country from Kentucky to Tucson, Arizona, having left her mother to strike out on her own. Turtle was so traumatized by the abuse that she was unable to speak. As Flight Behavior begins, Turtle is now six, “legally” adopted by Taylor, and living with Taylor and her boyfriend Jax. The girl seems happy, although she is disturbed by visions of her earlier abuse and is very worried by any indication that her relationship with her mom, Taylor, is at risk.

Taylor’s custody of Turtle is at risk, however, because of a fluke event that brings the story of Turtle’s adoption to public attention. A young Cherokee woman, a lawyer, sees Taylor and Turtle on TV, hears Taylor’s adoption story, and is convinced that the adoption is illegal, under the 1978 Federal Indian Child Welfare Act, which prohibits adoption of Indian children by outsiders without approval of the tribe itself. The lawyer, Annawake Fourkiller, contacts Taylor. Taylor promptly disappears with the child. The novel follows Taylor’s travails on the road, in Las Vegas and later in Seattle.
Eventually, Taylor and Taylor’s mother, Alice, face Annawake in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, the tribal capital of the Cherokee Nation. Alice and her daughter, Taylor, are part Cherokee and Alice knew her cousin, Sugar, during her teenage years in Mississippi. Sugar lives near Tahlequah and takes Alice into her home and helps her relate to her Cherokee relatives. The life of these relatives and their concerns about Taylor and Turtle are very moving and forms the heart of this novel.

I will quote a few passages that I hope convey the author’s writing style. This novel is well worth your reading time.

Since she found Turtle in her car and adopted her three years ago, she has had many moments of not believing she’s Turtle’s mother. This child is the miracle Taylor wouldn’t have let in the door if it had knocked. But that’s what miracles are, she supposes. The things nobody saw coming.

He tells her, “Sex will get you through times with no money better than money will get you through times with no sex.” “The thing I really missed was your jokes.”

They are a planeload of people ignoring each other. Alice has spent her life in small towns and is new to this form of politeness, in which people sit for all practical purposes on top of one another in a public place and behave like upholstery.

The fish curve and buck and thrust themselves against the current, dying to get upstream and pass themselves on. Taylor stands flanked by Turtle and Steven. For a long time the three of them are very still before the glass, framed by greenish light and a wall of solid effort. “I know how they feel,” Steven says, his voice amused. “It’s like getting into someplace that isn’t wheelchair accessible.” I know how they feel, Taylor thinks, and it’s not like getting into anywhere at all. It’s working yourself for all you’re worth to get ahead, and still going backward. She holds Turtle against her side so she won’t look up and see her mother’s tears.

Taylor is aware of being the white person here. Since her arrival in Oklahoma, she has felt her color as a kind of noticeable heat rising off her skin, something like a light bulb mistakenly left on and burning in a roomful of people who might disapprove.

Taylor can still remember the day when she first understood she’d received the absolute power of motherhood—that force that makes everyone else step back and agree that she knows what’s best for Turtle. It scared her to death. But giving it up now makes her feel infinitely small and alone.
Barbara Kingsolver is a marvelous writer with a great knack for characterization...what I like about Pigs in Heaven (the follow up to The Bean Trees) is that we get to see more of our favorite characters. Turtle has grown some, Taylor is totally invested in being her Mom, we get to learn more of Taylor's own mother, a real down to earth type and we get introduced to people of the Cherokee Nation. Through unlikely circumstance, Taylor has adopted a small Cherokee child who was basically left in her car. In this book, the well intended deception is found out and Turtle's future with Taylor is brought into doubt. A story with a possible ending which could traumatize all is humanized by the depth of our discovery of all the leading characters...and their real, innate kindness. It's a feel good story about Family; family by blood or family found...as both are given the greatest of respect here. Any violence here is merely implied, and any sex is neither gratuitous nor lacking in meaning. A book easily read and enjoyed by all ages. What I particularly enjoyed about this go round is that the first time I read this book, I was Taylor's age, this time around I am reading as her Mother's...and the story still holds together (and takes on even more meaning.) If you are ever in doubt about reading this author, choose to do so, you will never be disappointed.
I loved it. I also decided that I enjoyed the author's knowledge about the characters, Native Americans, and the cultures of the areas. She has a keen sense of humor also! She has become one of my favorite authors. I developed a relationship with the characters, and was cheering for them throughout. This novel is fast-reading, somewhat suspenseful, and light-hearted. I already had read her first novel, so I was easily immersed into this clever follow-up. I also learned a lot about the culture of some of the Native American tribes that I did not know.
I highly recommend this novel as a delightful experience!
This book is a follow up to the wonderful "The Bean Tree" where we meet one of the most interesting heroines of modern fiction, Taylor and the baby she "accidentally" adopts. In this novel we learn about the gripping events that come from that accidental adoption and how Taylor learns to face her fears and find the courage to not only stand up to official interference but to accept the love of a good man.. No one can write about women's emotions and fears like Barbara Kingsolver, told around events that are so exciting that one does not want to put the book down. And no one can describe the amazing landscape of western America as well as Kingsolver. A must read.