Synopses & Reviews
In her new essay collection, the beloved author of
High Tide in Tucson brings to us, out of one of history's darker moments, an extended love song to the world we still have.
Whether she is contemplating the Grand Canyon, her vegetable garden, motherhood, genetic engineering, or the future of a nation founded on the best of all human impulses, these essays are grounded in the author's belief that our largest problems have grown from the earth's remotest corners as well as our own backyards, and that answers may lie in both those places.
Sometimes grave, occasionally hilarious, and ultimately persuasive, Small Wonder is a hopeful examination of the people we seem to be, and what we might yet make of ourselves.
Synopsis
In her new essay collection, the beloved author of High Tide in Tucson brings to us out of one of history's darker moments an extended love song to the world we still have. From its opening parable gleaned from recent news about a lost child saved in an astonishing way, the book moves on to consider a world of surprising and hopeful prospects, ranging from an inventive conservation scheme in a remote jungle to the backyard flock of chickens tended by the author's small daughter.
Whether she is contemplating the Grand Canyon, her vegetable garden, motherhood, adolescence, genetic engineering, TV-watching, the history of civil rights, or the future of a nation founded on the best of all human impulses, these essays are grounded in the author's belief that our largest problems have grown from the earth's remotest corners as well as our own backyards, and that answers may lie in those places, too. In the voice Kingsolver's readers have come to rely on--sometimes grave, occasionally hilarious, and ultimately persuasive--Small Wonder is a hopeful examination of the people we seem to be, and what we might yet make of ourselves.
Synopsis
Twenty-two optimistic essays cover such topics as nature, family, literature, and the joys of everyday life while examining the challenges of war, poverty, and violence.
Synopsis
Twenty-two optimistic and articulate essays by the author of High Tide in Tucson cover such topics as nature, family, literature, gardening, adolescence, genetic engineering, civil rights, TV, and the joys of everyday life while examining the challenges of war, poverty, and violence. Reprint.
Table of Contents
Illustrated catalog of wonders -- Foreword -- Small wonder -- Saying grace -- Knowing our place -- Patience of a saint -- Seeing scarlet -- Setting free the crabs -- A forest's last stand -- Called out -- A fist in the eye of God -- Lily's chickens -- The one-eyed monster, and why I don't let him in -- Letter to a daughter at thirteen -- Letter to my mother -- Going to Japan -- Life is precious, or it's not -- Flying -- Household words -- What good is a story? -- Marking a passage -- Taming the beast with two backs -- Stealing apples -- And our flag was still there -- God's wife's measuring spoons -- Acknowledgments.