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Barbara Kingsolver

Author of The Poisonwood Bible: A Novel

42+ Works 90,132 Members 2,213 Reviews 551 Favorited
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About the Author

Barbara Kingsolver was born on April 8, 1955 in Annapolis, Maryland and grew up in Eastern Kentucky. As a child, Kingsolver used to beg her mother to tell her bedtime stories. She soon started to write stories and essays of her own, and at the age of nine, she began to keep a journal. After show more graduating with a degree in biology form De Pauw University in Indiana in 1977, Kingsolver pursued graduate studies in biology and ecology at the University of Arizona in Tucson. She earned her Master of Science degree in the early 1980s. A position as a science writer for the University of Arizona soon led Kingsolver into feature writing for journals and newspapers. Her articles have appeared in a number of publications, including The Nation, The New York Times, and Smithsonian magazines. In 1985, she married a chemist, becoming pregnant the following year. During her pregnancy, Kingsolver suffered from insomnia. To ease her boredom when she couldn't sleep, she began writing fiction Barbara Kingsolver's first fiction novel, The Bean Trees, published in 1988, is about a young woman who leaves rural Kentucky and finds herself living in urban Tucson. Since then, Kingsolver has written other novels, including Holding the Line, Homeland, and Pigs in Heaven. In 1995, after the publication of her essay collection High Tide in Tucson: Essays from Now or Never, Kingsolver was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from her alma mater, De Pauw University. Her latest works include The Lacuna and Flight Behavior. Barbara's nonfiction book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle was written with her family. This is the true story of the family's adventures as they move to a farm in rural Virginia and vow to eat locally for one year. They grow their own vegetables, raise their own poultry and buy the rest of their food directly from farmers markets and other local sources. (Bowker Author Biography) show less

Series

Works by Barbara Kingsolver

The Poisonwood Bible: A Novel (1998) 26,932 copies, 516 reviews
The Bean Trees (1988) 10,105 copies, 186 reviews
Prodigal Summer (2000) 9,218 copies, 198 reviews
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life (2007) 7,823 copies, 260 reviews
Pigs in Heaven (1993) 6,211 copies, 84 reviews
Animal Dreams (1990) 5,681 copies, 76 reviews
The Lacuna (2009) 5,471 copies, 259 reviews
Demon Copperhead (2022) 4,446 copies, 176 reviews
Flight Behavior (2012) 4,124 copies, 241 reviews
Small Wonder: Essays (2002) 2,329 copies, 34 reviews
Unsheltered (2018) 2,317 copies, 121 reviews
High Tide in Tucson: Essays from Now or Never (1995) 2,298 copies, 34 reviews
Homeland and Other Stories (1989) 1,728 copies, 13 reviews
The Best American Short Stories 2001 (2001) — Editor — 557 copies
How to Fly in Ten Thousand Easy Lessons: Poems (2020) — Author — 157 copies, 5 reviews
Barbara Kingsolver: Complete Fiction I (2001) 31 copies, 4 reviews
Coyote's Wild Home (2023) 17 copies, 2 reviews
Loveroot * 1 copy
Water Is Life {essay} (2010) 1 copy

Associated Works

King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa (1998) — Foreword, some editions — 4,983 copies, 130 reviews
A Sand County Almanac and Sketches Here and There (1949) — Introduction, some editions — 4,623 copies, 64 reviews
Writers on Writing: Collected Essays from the New York Times (2001) — Contributor — 455 copies, 4 reviews
American Earth: Environmental Writing Since Thoreau (2008) — Contributor — 425 copies, 1 review
Sisters of the Earth: Women's Prose and Poetry About Nature (1991) — Contributor — 406 copies, 5 reviews
Knitting Yarns: Writers on Knitting (2013) — Contributor — 278 copies, 14 reviews
Teaching with Fire: Poetry That Sustains the Courage to Teach (2003) — Contributor — 205 copies, 1 review
I Should Have Stayed Home: The Worst Trips of the Great Writers (1994) — Contributor — 184 copies, 5 reviews
My Favorite Fantasy Story (2000) — Contributor — 171 copies
This Is My Best: Great Writers Share Their Favorite Work (2004) — Contributor — 165 copies, 3 reviews
Intimate Nature: The Bond Between Women and Animals (1998) — Contributor — 121 copies
Best Food Writing 2007 (2007) — Contributor — 113 copies, 1 review
Heart of the Land: Essays on Last Great Places (1995) — Contributor — 110 copies
War No More: Three Centuries of American Antiwar and Peace Writing (2016) — Contributor — 94 copies, 1 review
The Seasons of Women: An Anthology (1995) — Contributor — 46 copies
The Best American Magazine Writing 2011 (2011) — Contributor — 37 copies, 1 review
Spring: A Spiritual Biography of the Season (2006) — Contributor — 36 copies, 1 review
Birds in the Hand: Fiction and Poetry about Birds (2004) — Contributor — 35 copies, 1 review
Atomic Ghost: Poets Respond to the Nuclear Age (1995) — Contributor — 32 copies
New Stories from the South: The Year's Best, 1988 (1988) — Contributor — 8 copies
The Caedmon Short Story Collection (2001) — Contributor — 7 copies
Race Traitor 10 (1999) — Contributor — 4 copies
To Eat with Grace (2014) — Contributor — 2 copies
Journeys (1996) — Contributor — 1 copy

Tagged

20th century (282) adoption (345) Africa (1,410) American (441) American literature (451) anthology (253) Appalachia (482) Arizona (437) Barbara Kingsolver (452) book club (274) Congo (588) contemporary fiction (340) ecology (531) environment (808) essays (1,175) family (926) farming (314) fiction (9,175) food (855) gardening (281) historical fiction (872) literary fiction (299) literature (532) memoir (539) Mexico (376) missionaries (667) Native American (295) Native Americans (273) nature (1,039) non-fiction (1,693) novel (1,129) own (520) read (964) religion (541) short stories (465) Southwest (248) to-read (3,337) unread (454) USA (284) women (356)

Common Knowledge

Canonical name
Kingsolver, Barbara
Legal name
Kingsolver, Barbara Ellen
Birthdate
1955-04-08
Gender
female
Nationality
USA
Birthplace
Annapolis, Maryland, USA
Places of residence
Carlisle, Kentucky, USA
Léopoldville, Congo (now Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo)
Greencastle, Indiana, USA
Tucson, Arizona, USA
Washington County, Virginia, USA
England, UK (show all 8)
France
Canary Islands, Spain
Education
DePauw University (BS|1977|biology)
University of Arizona (MS|ecology and evolutionary biology)
Occupations
novelist
poet
short-story writer
Relationships
Kingsolver, Camille (daughter)
Hopp, Steven (husband)
Hopp, Lily (daughter)
Organizations
Rock Bottom Remainders (band)
Awards and honors
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (2023)
James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction (2022)
National Humanities Medal (2000)
Best American Science and Nature Writing (2001)
Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award (2011)
Arizona Press Club Award for Outstanding Feature Writing (1986) (show all 14)
Women's Prize for Fiction (2010, 2023)
Orange Prize for Fiction (2010)
James Beard Foundation Award (2008)
Los Angeles Times Book Prize (1993)
Library of Virginia Lifetime Achievement Award (2014)
Virginia Women in History (2018)
Honorary Doctorate of Letters, DePauw University (1994)
Phi Beta Kappa (DePauw University, 1977)
Agent
Frances Goldin (Frances Goldin Literary Agency)
Short biography
Barbara Kingsolver is an American novelist, essayist and poet. She was raised in rural Kentucky and lived briefly in the Congo in her early childhood. Kingsolver earned degrees in biology at DePauw University and the University of Arizona and worked as a freelance writer before she began writing novels. Her widely known works include The Poisonwood Bible, the tale of a missionary family in the Congo, and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, a non-fiction account of her family's attempts to eat locally. Her work often focuses on topics such as social justice, biodiversity and the interaction between humans and their communities and environments.

Members

Discussions

"Demon Copperhead" by Barbara Kingsolver in 75 Books Challenge for 2023 (March 29)
August 2019: Barbara Kingsolver in Monthly Author Reads (December 2020)
Barbara Kingsolver: American Author Challenge in 75 Books Challenge for 2015 (December 2015)
[The Lacuna] by [[Barbara Kingsolver]] in Orange January/July (July 2011)

Reviews

The first quarter of the book was tough to get into - but since this was for a book club, I had to keep going. After about the halfway mark, I started to enjoy it. I must say, I'm not really sure WHY the change occurred, just that it did...
 
Flagged
jawertman | 120 other reviews | Dec 23, 2024 |
Wow. Just wow. The author dropped you deep into immediacy and kept you there the whole time. Such mastery of technique - even in little things like the words that Demon gets wrong. Depressing? Um, yes, but gorgeous and ending on a hopeful note. Dayenu.
 
Flagged
jawertman | 175 other reviews | Dec 23, 2024 |
Very interesting for quite a while, then it slows to a crawl and drags on -
 
Flagged
kyurenka | 175 other reviews | Dec 23, 2024 |

Lists

Africa (1)
AP Lit (1)
1990s (2)
hopes (1)

Awards

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Associated Authors

Steven L. Hopp Photographer
Katrina Kenison Series Editor
Paul Mirocha Illustrator
Barbara Klein Moss Contributor
Jess Row Contributor
Roy Parvin Contributor
John Updike Contributor
Dorothy West Contributor
Trevanian Contributor
Elizabeth Graver Contributor
Rick Bass Contributor
Peter Orner Contributor
Peter Ho Davies Contributor
Claire Davis Contributor
Nancy Reisman Contributor
Marisa Silver Contributor
Andrea Lee Contributor
Katherine Shonk Contributor
Alice Munro Contributor
Rick Moody Contributor
Ha Jin Contributor
Andrea Barrett Contributor
Annette Sanford Contributor
Guillemette Belleteste Traduction, Translator
Maaike Post Translator
Arjen Mulder Translator
Martine Aubert Translator, Traduction
Claire Buchbinder Traduction, Translator
C. J. Critt Narrator
Juha Ahokas Translator
Damián Alou Traductor
Aurora Ballester Translator
Bente Klinge Translator
Han Meyer Translator
Geoff Spear Cover photo
Julie Metz Cover designer
Elliott Beard Designer
Lisa Desimini Cover artist
Suzanne Noli Cover designer
Susan Pearce Author photo
Anne-Marie Augustyniak Collaboratrice pour la traduction française
Martine Béquié Translator
Mercè Diago Translator
Abel Debritto Translator
Lourdes Sette Translator
Richard A. Houser Illustrator
Hank Daniel Photographer
Fritz Metsch Designer
Noelia Jiménez Translator
Margara Averbach Translator
Lars Krumlinde Translator
Sylvia Spatz Übersetzer
Julie Sibony Traduction
Valérie Morlot Traduction
Dominique Peters Traduction
Paula Parker Narrator
Céline Leroy Translator

Statistics

Works
42
Also by
31
Members
90,132
Popularity
#109
Rating
4.1
Reviews
2,213
ISBNs
566
Languages
20
Favorited
551

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