Pigs in Heaven (end)

I have just finished reading Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver.  As I stated halfway through the book, I was disappointed in the novel, and that holds true throughout the story.  I think that Kingsolver's first book was much better.  However, Pigs in Heaven was still a good read, just not up to the standards of her first novel.  This book was about how the Cherokee Tribe tries to bring Turtle back into Native American life.  Obviously, Taylor objects, but there is nothing that she can do about it.  I think that the oddest thing about this book that the climax was not really apparent until the very end of the book, the second to last page in fact. If this book were a spiritual journey, or a conflict within a person, it would have made sense.  However, this book's main conflict was external, so it is abnormal that the climax is so late in the book.  I think that the rising action was overdone.  Kingsolver made it too long- to the point where it was tedious to read.  There were 354 pages in this book, but I think if it were only 300 pages it would have been much better.  Let's take a look at what I think the story structure is:

If I were to describe this story how Kurt Vonnegut would, I would say it is a mix between "From Bad to Worse" and "Which Way is Up".  I say this because the main character, Taylor, is in a normal situation, but gets thrown into bad situation.  This situation does not get better, however, and it probably gets worse.  This is where it gets tricky.  Many events in the story have an effect on Taylor that is unclear.  For example, she gets shared custody with Turtle.  This could be a good thing because Turtle gets to know her Cherokee culture, or a bad thing be  cause Turtle gets less time with Taylor.  Obviously, things get confusing.

All of this said, Pigs in Heaven was still a fun book to read.  It was engaging and another example of how Kingsolver writes effectively.  One of the main motifs in this novel was luck.  The reason that Taylor and Turtle got into this whole mess was because they were put on national television for saving a man named Lucky Buster.  The book states, "Lucky and Turtle are asleep in the backseat" (Kingsolver 30).  The concept of luck and chance are tied with Turtle throughout the novel.  Another more examples are when Taylor and Turtle are in Las Vegas (obviously luck is apparent here) and they find $50 on their car. 

One thing that I love about how Kingsolver writes is the way she ends chapters.  There is almost always and interesting, thought-provoking quote that can be applied in many different ways.  Some examples of great ending sentences are: "Something like that is as bad or as good as a telephone ringing in the night: either way, you're not as alone as you think" (Kingsolver 9), "One by one the birds emerge from the desert and come back to claim their tree" (Kingsolver 81), "This man in ordinary jean, whose thoughts she believed she knew, opens his mouth and becomes a foreigner.  It occurs to her that this one thing about people you can never understand well enough: how entirely inside themselves they are" (Kingsolver 180).  There are many other great quotes throughout the novel.  I'd bet you could make a book with just those quotes.