Search - Animal Dreams

I love Barbara Kingsolver and was hoping to love this book but I only liked it. I liked some of the ironies of the book and the characters were likebale but I found myself skimming it to get through it quicker.

Animal Dreams centers on the Noline family, father and two daughters, but especially is the story of daughter Cody Noline. Cody returns to her hometown after growing up and finally escaping only to find out the hard way that there is no escape from life. She longs to find the meaning and purpose in her life as her sister seems to have found, but she's repressing all her memories and waiting for someone else to figure it out and tell her about it.

Cody comes to terms with her life with a little help from hometown outsiders and this book's resolution is a bit more upbeat and positive than Poisonwood Bible, although Kingsolver's style is very similar in both books so if you enjoy reading her narrative, Animal Dreams will not disappoint.

"Animals dream about the thins they do in the daytime, just like people do. If you want sweet dreams, you've got to live a sweet life." So says Loyd Peregrina, a handsome Apache trainman and latter-day philosopher. But when Codi Noline returns to her hometown, Loyd's advice is painfully out of her reach. Dreamless and at the end of her rope, Codi comes back to Grace, Arizona, to confront her past and face her ailing, distant father. What she finds is a town threatened by a silent environmental catastrophe, some startling clues to her own identity, and a man whose view of the world could change the course of her life. Blending flashbacks, dreams, and Native American legends, Animal Dreams is a suspenseful love story and a moving exploration of life's largest commitments. With this work, the acclaimed author of The Bean Trees and Homeland and Other Stories sustains her familiar voice while giving readers her most remarkable book yet.