Small Wonder by Barbara Kingsolver

I was a little late noticing Small Wonder by Barbara Kingsolver. I had ordered the book when it was first reviewed, but I did not read it until after I saw the author on a CPAN-2 book discussion. I was impressed by her wit and rhetoric. The very next week, my minister quoted her in a sermon. I moved the book to the top of my reading list.

Kingsolver lives outside Tucson, Arizona, gardening, raising her daughters, and writing novels and essays. While she is most known for her novels, this is a collection of her published essays, many in response to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack and subsequent invasion of Afghanistan. My favorite is a four-page piece about forgiveness titled “Going to Japan.” It is followed in the book by “Life is Precious, or It’s Not,” which discusses the mixed messages our children get about justified and unjustified use of weapons to kill. Throughout the book Kingsolver questions how our daily lives contribute to the world crisis and how to live an ethical life. The decisions you make every day are important. This book was written in 2002 but is still timely. Every public library should have this book.