The Bean Trees (end)

I have just finished reading the novel The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver and I found it to be amazing.  In the midway review of the book, I said that the story was slow and it was only an average book.  The second half of the book turned out to be great, however.  The plot developed a lot more and there was action involved.  I thoroughly enjoyed reading this novel.  The book was incredibly satisfying to read because the novel goes full circle.  In the beginning, Taylor moves out of Kentucky and has to drive all the way to Tucson, Arizona.  Along the way, she picks up her now daughter, Turtle.  In her initial journey to Arizona, she is constantly complaining about how the road is very flat and it is a terrible time.  However, at the end of the book, she goes back to Oklahoma (where she received Turtle) in order to gain legal custody of Turtle.  She achieves this goal and then has to go back to Tucson, obviously.  This time on the road to Arizona, Taylor is happy and enjoys being on the road.  The book states, "We had cleared Oklahoma City and were out on the plain before sundown.  It felt like old times, heading into the low western horizon" (Kingsolver 232).  In gained much satisfaction in knowing that everything was going to be alright with this family that the reader truly understands.  At the end of the reading, I couldn't help but have a smile on my face and genuinely felt like I fulfilled a goal.
I want to talk a little bit about the story structure.  Like I said earlier, the beginning of the book was very slow and a little bit tedious to read.  However, the end of the book was really interesting and I could not stop reading.  I think the exposition was a little bit too long and the inciting moment does not really occur until around the midpoint of the novel.  The rising action was very good, but it was cut a little bit short because of the length of the exposition.  The climax occurred towards the very end of the story, with maybe 15 pages afterwards.  The falling action was very satisfying because it achieved the goal of unraveling the story without being boring.  I think the story structure looks something like this:

 

If I were to talk about the story structure as Kurt Vonnegut would describe it, I think it would be something along the lines of this:

The story starts off with Taylor in a poor, poverty-stricken Kentucky neighborhood where she hates it.  Then, things get worse when she decides to leave Kentucky and hates the road even more.  She starts to think she may regret leaving.  But things get better, quickly.  She then receives Turtle, her joy in life, and finds her six best friends.  She is living happily in Tucson, until two of her friends, illegal immigrants, must go to Oklahoma in order to not be captured by border patrol.  She drives then there, and feels extremely sad and depressed.  But, this trip was not all bad.  She legally adopts turtle and returns to Tucson with a heart of happiness and fulfillment.