Favorite Books

I have so many favorite books but I have chosen two to elaborate on.

I received The Forest Lover as a birthday gift one year and I must say I am glad to have gotten it.  The Forest Lover by Susan Vreeland  is a study about Canadian artist Emily Carr.  Although fictionalized, it is based on real events surrounding the artist.  The  story is about Carr's desire to be recognized in her field.  She is concerned for the tribal peoples of a Victorian Canada, whose culture is dying out.  She camps out in the wilderness of Northern Vancouver in order to paint these people and the totems that are being removed by a white society.  I found this story entertaining, heart wrenching and fun.  Her persistence to succeed prevailed in the end!  Photos of Carr's real paintings are placed throughout the book.  This book was so fabulous I have read it twice!

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver is about an evangelical Baptist missionary who in 1959 moves  his family from Bethlehem, Georgia to a village in the Belgian Congo.   The story is narrated by five women of the family: Orleanna, wife to missionary Nathan and daughters Rachel, Leah, Adah and Ruth May.  The women tell of how they are each growing and changing in this foreign land along with each one's point of view of their relationships between them selves and the people of Kilanga.  
I love the daughters thoughts of this new world around them. They now barter for food, sometimes go hungry and curse their dad's name for bringing them to such a place of political unrest.  Wonderfully written and easy to read...I found it hard to put down.

Other books include: The Birth of Venus, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter and five Quarters of the Orange.

I am always looking for great reads, please leave a comment on what book you are reading!