Book Review: Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver

There has always been a certain mystique about the Appalachians for those of us who live outside the area. Mountain men, moonshine, and the Carter Family have all contributed to the creation of a romanticized view of life in this hardscrabble territory. The poor but pure impression has been furthered by popular culture through movies and television to the point that conceptions have drifted far away from reality.

Barbara Kingsolver has offered an antidote to the usual rose tinted perceptions with her novel Prodigal Summer. With the theme of survival prevalent through the book we follow three disparate characters through a summer of growth, struggle and acceptance. Individually they represent an aspect of the struggle to preserve life, and as a group they exemplify how simply surviving is sometimes not enough.

Deanna Wolf works for the state as a naturalist and lives in a cabin on the mountain overlooking the valley she was bred and born in. Nominally her job is to ensure that trails are maintained and that plant and animal life are protected from human influence. But she has taken on another task, one that if any of the farmers down below knew about would have them literally up in arms.

She is intent on restoring the balance of nature on the mountain by ensuring the survival of a family of coyotes. For her they represent the reintroduction of a much-needed predator into the natural food chain on the mountain. To the farmers they would be seen only as a threat to their livestock. Deanna has been living on her own with no human contact save for her weekly supply drops until one day she chances upon a younger man walking through her woods.

His presence sets off a conflict of emotions she hadn't planned on dealing with. On the one hand she discovers she wants him around, and has a desire for male companionship. However he is a hunter who makes no bones about the fact that he has no sympathy for coyotes, so she has to hide her efforts to protect the local pack from him.

Down in the valley two other individuals are doing their best to make sense of life. Lusa Maluf Landowski is recently widowed and has inherited her husband's family farm. They had only been married a year when she lost him in a traffic accident. During that year she failed win the acceptance of her husband's family. At the funeral she was politely enough, but it was her eldest sister in law who was the centre of attention. He had been their brother long before, and longer then, she had been his wife.

Article Author: Richard Marcus

Richard Marcus is the author of the What Will Happen In Eragon IV? and The Unofficial Heroes Of Olympus Companion, both published by Ulysses Press. He has had his work published in print and online all over the world including the German edition of Rolling Stone Magazine and www.Qantara.de. …

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