Butterfly in the Sky

What I was a kid, my girl Friday's mother once said, "Oh, I just can't read books at night. Because then I want to know what happens so bad, that I don't go to sleep!" Like so many other times in my life, I thought she was crazy. I mean, stories are great and all, but I am not losing sleep over it. Pfft.

But I have experienced this weird phenomenon. Recently, I have come to the conclusion that I need books. For my well being. I get more frustrated more easily without them. I get depressed. I don't know why. But when I have a story I am reading, I am a better person all around. More patient, more kind, less stressed. Kind of strange, right? But they seem to be my drug of choice. See, I like my old favorites. I am quite content to read these certain books on my shelf over and over and over again. Something new is not an experience I have very often. But I decided that since I have been loving Barbara Kingsolver for so long and quote Prodigal Summer like it was the bible or something, that maybe I should give her other works a whirl. Oh, man. I am so glad that I did.

First, I went to the public library and pulled out the books they had on the shelf by Kingsolver. The Bean Trees and Pigs in Heaven. I have read them by now; they are a set with a similar cast of characters surrounding a mother, Taylor, and her foundling Cherokee child, Turtle.

What I found out about my favorite author in The Bean Trees is how she focuses on human tragedy that occurs on the large scale and then gives it a personal face. Turtle, the child who survives sexual and physical abuse (not detailed in the story. I don't have the stomach for such details in fiction. Real life is enough for me.) Esteban and Esperanza, the Guatemalan refugees, fleeing certain death. The Cherokee Nation, which she talks about more in the next book, but reflecting on how American Indians have to deal with interpersonal violence, according to statistics, more often than other racial/cultural groups in the US. (Although she slightly contradicts this idea in Pigs in Heaven, painting the Cherokee Nation as a Utopia, where abuse is inflicted by white outsiders.) In the center is Taylor, who is young and fresh faced and keeps being handed knowledge of tragedy. It is like she is a pillar, a living breathing pillar that is surrounded by falling tiles. While she has not fallen, has not experienced the tragedy firsthand, she does not emerge unscathed. What we are being shown is that the knowledge of tragedy changes us, too.

There is a progression and the wheel turns to the point where it is Taylor's turn to experience hardship; at first she falters. She blames herself. Others blame her. "Why weren't you here?" "Why didn't you prevent this?" And she believes this, that she is the cause of the crime, that she is responsible for actions taken against her and her daughter. (Why O Why do we always "Blame the Mother"?)But then, perhaps because of the lessons learned by watching others fall, she fights back and emerges a victor.

In Pigs in Heaven, a lot of the plot repeats itself in different circumstances. The Event occurs. This good deed actually turns out to be Taylor and Turtle's undoing. Oprah is involved and the Cherokee Nation begins to investigate Turtle's less than legal adoption. It was a great story that made me want to see the Stomp Dances, to grow my hair into a rope of braid, and to research my own Cherokee roots, however far back they might be (Great Great Grandmother? Or was it Grandfather? I don't know). I did feel that painting the reservation as Heaven might be a bit much. But then when I critically thought about it, I realized that maybe just because it is not my idea of Heaven (poverty and trailers, no thanks), that does not take away from what another culture might believe of Heaven. Maybe my American materialism cannot understand an impoverished Heaven... Still, I can't help but feel that this book does not give an accurate portrayal of Cherokee life focusing sheerly on pastoral familial bliss. Where is the reality of hardship, sweat, blood? Where is the bitterness? (This is just a feeling. I have no data/research/personal experience to back this up. This being said, I wonder if I should mention it at all. But that is the point of a book review. To say how a work made you feel.)

Of course, this is a very generic run-down of the stories, but they kept me up to all hours of the night. This combination of growing up and motherhood and social consciousness. So run down to your local library and pick up The Bean Trees and Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver.

(Cue Reading Rainbow Theme Song...)