Flight Behavior

I did not care for this book. I really appreciate Barbara Kingsolver's novels. I used to teach several different titles, and I try to keep up with her newest novels. This is one I hadn't read until now. I had trouble finishing; when I had about 100 pages left, I read some reviews to see if I was just struggling for my own personal reasons (distracted, tired, etc.) or if others were feeling what I was about this book. I read several reviews that identified my struggles. I usually savor her character development and while these characters were nicely developed, I felt that some were cut short or overdeveloped for the purpose they served in the novel. Several people noticed parallels to other novels of hers. I did too, but they felt more like repetitive motifs and forced ideas (allusions, political viewpoints, etc). I get that the novel is an environmentally conscious book, and that was the most vibrant, successful portion of this book in my opinion. I love learning about true topics via fiction. However, I felt like there were forced sub-plots and unnecessary embellishments. This book could have been better with about 130 pages of text eliminated.

Transcendent. A novel about biology, ecology, geology, psychology and even “family life” science. But not just. Never just. Enchanting.

Like most great fiction, this novel is about a lot of things. On the surface it's about the environment and the damage that climate change is doing to it. But it's also about the importance of educating ourselves–about the environment, science in general, and just about everything. Plus, it's about communities and their interaction, such as the outsiders coming to Appalachia with certain preconceived notions, as well as the notions of the local people about those outsiders. Again, education is in order on both sides of that divide.

At one point, Ovid Byron, the scientist who is studying the monarch butterflies who have suddenly settled onto a mountain in East Tennessee, says: “Ecology, [my field,] is the study of biological communities. How populations interact.” He's talking about butterflies. Kingsolver is talking about more than that.

Much preferred the Poisonwood Bible

♥ Barbara Kingsolver ♥

If you have read all of her books, after awhile they start to be a tiny bit predictable, and I do not care at all. I would read 1000 books about marginalized women fighting the odds to rally their communities to protect the environment.

I loved Dellarobia and Dovey. I loved all the layers here, and I loved that each character had depth and complexity–even the megachurch pastor, even the controlling mother-in-law, even the grad students. I love the intersectionality of class and race and gender. I love the the privilege checking. I love the butterflies.

I LOVE BARBARA KINGSOLVER.

Kingsolver is such a beautiful writer. Just check out the first line in this book: “A certain feeling comes from throwing your good life away, and it is one part rapture.”

She wrote one of my favorite books ever (Poisonwood Bible.)

But. This one was just OK for me. I think it had potential, but the message was far too heavy handed, especially considering I was already familiar with a lot of the science she put in at length in this book, scattered around in bits and pieces of slow moving dialogue.

Besides the slowness, what really irked me about this book was how simple Kingsolver made the country folk. I don't think she intended to be condescending toward them–but it came off that way to me. A lot of the characters felt like backwoods stereotypes, which I don't think is necessarily accurate for many rural, farming families.

(I thought I was taking a break. From reading about tribalism, morality, ignorance, doom. But evidently Kingsolver has been reading the same books I have and wanted to use her voice to spread the awareness. So although this wasn't the break I wanted, it served as an important wake-up call: these problems won't go away just because I stop thinking about them.)

As for the book: beautiful, as is all the Kingsolver I've read. Her language is just so vivid. Few writers get me to stop and reread (to relish) as much as she does. Flight Behavior felt different from other works of her I've read. I found its overall tone melancholic, suffused with loss. Not resigned, just ... sorrowful over lost life and lost opportunities. This is a lovely book and an important one. I wonder if it'll reach its audience.

Marvellous social observation with butterflies. Best novel I've read for a wee whilie.

Not my favorite Kingsolver novel (that would be The Poisonwood Bible), but a good read I got as a birthday present from roommates. Kingsolver can be a little heavy-handed with her moral lessons; in this novel, it's that we need to do something about climate change RIGHT NOW (which begs the question–who reading Kingsolver novels doesn't already believe that?). Nonetheless, she reliably provides spunky and wise female characters who are also not annoyingly perfect, and the emotional heft of this particular novel (regarding marriage, class, and identity) feels genuine.

Although climate change underpins the book, it was hearing Dellarobia's thoughts that hooked me. Kingsolver character development at its best.

Short Review: I don't know how Kingsolver writes about such serious topics without it feeling like propaganda. Most ‘issue fiction' is very heavy handed. Kingsolver somehow write in a way that is about the art of the book and the serious topics just seem to give weight to the art instead of tearing the art down. This is a novel about global warming. But it is about people, not just a topic. An east TN woman is the main character. She is so tied up by her poverty, her oppressive life, and her mediocre marriage that she just wants to escape. Millions of Monarch butterflies come to her husband's family's land instead of their normal Mexican wintering grounds. For her and the butterflies life becomes unmoored.

My full review is on my blog at http://bookwi.se/flight-behavior/