Pigs in Heaven (middle)

I have now finished half of Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver.  This book is about the story of a girl named Taylor Greer and her adopted daughter Turtle.  Many of you probably know their story because you have been reading my blog.  The Bean Trees was the prequel to this book and I loved it.  In the story, Turtle saves a man's life and becomes a national hero.  Because of this publicity, a Cherokee lawyer finds out that Turtle is not legally adopted by Taylor.  Taylor freaks out and does not want to give up Turtle so she takes Turtle and her Mother on an adventure throughout the country.
So far, it has been decent, but not spectacular.  As I said in my previous post, I thought that since there is more adventure (than the Bean Trees) I would enjoy it more, but I must say that is incorrect.  I do not find Pigs in Heaven bad, but it is not nearly as good as the Bean Trees, which I thoroughly enjoyed.  I think the main reason is because the character development is not as good.  In this case, the amount of action and and adventure actually hurts the novel because there is not enough time to really get to know the characters and have them be part of your life.  I think that character development was the best quality of the Bean Trees and without it, the book is not that great.  I do not think the plot is unbelievable entertaining, and really all other aspects of the book are average.  The character development made Kingsolver's writing great and when she lacks it, the books are only okay.  An example of this sub par character development is the introduction of a character named Gabe.  Granted, this is not a very important character, but it still displays the development.  A woman named Annie states, " 'Dellon hates when I bring up Gabe'... 'He hates when you bring up Gabe, because he's the oldest and he thinks he should have done something to keep the family from getting torn up' "(Kingsolver 59).  That is the only instance of Gabe being mentioned early in the book, but he is brought back up again later and no more knowledge is given.  Somehow, Kingsolver expects the reader to put the puzzle together, but we only have half of the pieces.