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Loading... Animal Dreams (edition 1991)by Barbara Kingsolver (Author)
Work InformationAnimal Dreams by Barbara Kingsolver
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. Animal dreams is a book about the strong bond between two sisters Codi & Halllie. When Halllie risks her life by traveling to Nicaragua during the height of its Civil War to help the poor villagers raise crops Codi goes into a downward tailspin believing her life has no meaningful purpose. And while this story is interesting enough and Codi eventually does discover a purpose in life late in the novel, she spends so much time thinking about Hallie that I couldn't help but think that a novel that focused on the life Hallie was living would have made for a much more interesting story. Protagonist Codi Noline returns to her small hometown in Arizona, after fifteen years, to help her aging father, the town’s doctor, who has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Codi felt like an outsider growing up. She and her father are not close. She is hired to teach biology at the local high school and is staying with a friend. She is concerned about her younger sister, Hallie, who has relocated to Nicaragua to assist with agricultural education, at a time when the Contras are engaged in violent civil unrest. The story is told in alternating perspectives between Codi, in first person, and her father, in third person. If you have read Kingsolver’s books before, you will find familiar territory – environmental activism, beautiful writing about nature, and a strong female protagonist with issues to overcome. In this case, the environment is being threatened by a large corporation harvesting natural resources to use in the manufacturing, while killing the microbiota in the area. The stark beauty of the American southwestern desert is elegantly evoked, with its ancestral Puebloan dwellings and natural springs. It is a slowly developing novel that relies on many simultaneous threads, including a family secret, a love story, several environmental elements, a willingness to act on one’s beliefs, and a community coming together in a common cause. Kingsolver has crafted these components into a compelling, multi-layered story.
Barbara Kingsolver is one of an increasing number of American novelists who are trying to rewrite the political, cultural and spiritual relationships between our country's private and public spheres. Is contained inHomeland and Other Stories | Animal Dreams | The Bean Trees | Pigs in Heaven | The Poisonwood Bible | Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver Has as a student's study guideAwardsNotable Lists
From Barbara Kingsolver, the acclaimed author of Flight Behavior, The Lacuna, The Bean Trees, and other modern classics, Animal Dreams is a passionate and complex novel about love, forgiveness, and one woman's struggle to find her place in the world. At the end of her rope, Codi Noline returns to her Arizona home to face her ailing father, with whom she has a difficult, distant relationship. There she meets handsome Apache trainman Loyd Peregrina, who tells her, If you want sweet dreams, you've got to live a sweet life. Filled with lyrical writing, Native American legends, a tender love story, and Codi's quest for identity, Animal Dreams is literary fiction at its very best. This edition includes a P.S. section with additional insights from Barbara Kingsolver, background material, suggestions for further reading, and more. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.54Literature English (North America) American fiction 20th Century 1945-1999LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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“The very least you can do in your life is figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope. Not admire it from a distance but live right in it, under its roof.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, Animal Dreams ( )