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Cover of The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

The Poisonwood Bible

Barbara Kingsolver

  • 576 pages · about 10 hours
  • First published 1998
  • 47 editions
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1 About this book

The Poisonwood Bible is a story told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it -- from garden seeds to Scripture -- is calamitously transformed on African soil.

What follows is a suspenseful epic of one family's tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa. This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more.

Good for readers who want: historical fiction and a long read.

  • Africa
  • Historical fiction
  • Murder
  • Racism
  • Political
  • Missionaries
  • Family life
  • Religious fundamentalism

2 About Barbara Kingsolver

Born 1955

Barbara Ellen Kingsolver (born April 8, 1955) is an American novelist, essayist, and poet. Her widely known works include The Poisonwood Bible, the tale of a missionary family in the Congo; and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, a nonfiction account of her family's attempts to eat locally. In 2023, she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for the novel Demon Copperhead.

Bio adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)

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