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The Lacuna

3.71 of 5 stars 3.71 · rating details · 27,068 ratings · 5,421 reviews

In her most accomplished novel, Barbara Kingsolver takes us on an epic journey from the Mexico City of artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo to the America of Pearl Harbor, FDR, and J. Edgar Hoover. "The Lacuna" is a poignant story of a man pulled between two nations as they invent their modern identities.

Born in the United States, reared in a series of provisional househol...more In her most accomplished novel, Barbara Kingsolver takes us on an epic journey from the Mexico City of artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo to the America of Pearl Harbor, FDR, and J. Edgar Hoover. "The Lacuna" is a poignant story of a man pulled between two nations as they invent their modern identities.

Born in the United States, reared in a series of provisional households in Mexico--from a coastal island jungle to 1930s Mexico City--Harrison Shepherd finds precarious shelter but no sense of home on his thrilling odyssey. Life is whatever he learns from housekeepers who put him to work in the kitchen, errands he runs in the streets, and one fateful day, by mixing plaster for famed Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. He discovers a passion for Aztec history and meets the exotic, imperious artist Frida Kahlo, who will become his lifelong friend. When he goes to work for Lev Trotsky, an exiled political leader fighting for his life, Shepherd inadvertently casts his lot with art and revolution, newspaper headlines and howling gossip, and a risk of terrible violence.

Meanwhile, to the north, the United States will soon be caught up in the internationalist goodwill of World War II. There in the land of his birth, Shepherd believes he might remake himself in America's hopeful image and claim a voice of his own. He finds support from an unlikely kindred soul, his stenographer, Mrs. Brown, who will be far more valuable to her employer than he could ever know. Through darkening years, political winds continue to toss him between north and south in a plot that turns many times on the unspeakable breach--the lacuna--between truth and public presumption.

With deeply compelling characters, a vivid sense of place, and a clear grasp of how history and public opinion can shape a life, Barbara Kingsolver has created an unforgettable portrait of the artist--and of art itself. "The Lacuna" is a rich and daring work of literature, establishing its author as one of the most provocative and important of her time.(less)

Hardcover, 508 pages

Published November 3rd 2009 by Harper (first published January 1st 2009)

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Jul 04, 2012 Sath rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction, lgbt, reviewed, on-my-bookshelf, charity-shop-bought, second-hand

The story is told as the collected journals of Harrison Shepherd, put together after his death by his secretary and friend Violet Brown. Beginning with his childhood, (just before WorldWar2), as his mexican mother leaves his american father and takes him with her back to mexico. Harrison writes his journals because he can't help but write, like other people cannot help breathing, he is destined to become an author one day.
Harrison's childhood is surreally beautiful, the problems of his chain-smo...more The story is told as the collected journals of Harrison Shepherd, put together after his death by his secretary and friend Violet Brown. Beginning with his childhood, (just before WorldWar2), as his mexican mother leaves his american father and takes him with her back to mexico. Harrison writes his journals because he can't help but write, like other people cannot help breathing, he is destined to become an author one day.
Harrison's childhood is surreally beautiful, the problems of his chain-smoking, gold digging mother are distant. His journals are all in the 3rd person, nothing ever happens directly to Harrison. It's like looking at everything from underwater.

Harrison gets a job mixing plaster for the famous mexican muralist Diego Rivera and his wife Frieda Kahlo. which gradually turns into a job as a cook, and then also a secretary. Then the exiled Lev Trotsky arrives, taken into the houshold of the Riveras, and Harrison can't help but be a part of the revolution, even so he is still always on the outside, an observer, written in the 3rd person.

In the second half of the novel, back in America, Harrison finally begins to use the personal pronoun, I. No longer talking about himself in the 3rd person, he finally owns his own words, and talks directly about himself. Yet somehow he is grown distant, like letters from a child hood friend that you grew apart from. I find it harder to connect with Harrison now, which is ironic. But it leaves space to be covered over with by the political upheaval in America. Harrison's personal life seems to happen far in the background, while in front of us the FBI and the Un-American commitee are hunting down communist sympathisers. I feel bad now for every silly joking utterance of 'bloody commies', because I never meant it, and I never realised how real it once was. I feel like I've never paid attention in history class.

"Whenever I hear thing kind of thing," he said, "a person speaking about constitutional rights, free speech, and so forth, I think, 'how can he be such a sap? Now I can be sure that man is a Red.' A word to the wise, Mr. Shepherd. We just do not hear a real American speaking in that Manner."

Theres a horribly real feeling of suffocation in this second half of the novel, neighbours turning against him, his readers turning against him, no matter how much they loved his first 2 books, now they believe any lies printed in the newspapers. The same happening to hundreds of US citizens, once they're labeled as communists, they're done for, no matter who they really are or what they really said. But it could easily be happening today. Replace the word 'communist' with the word 'terrorist', and this could be America today. It could be britain and any non mainstream political party - the British national party for instance, once the papers label you as a BNP supporter, you're demonised.

Violet Brown reminds us, when we're already well over 100 pages into the novel, that these are the private journals of a dead man who never wanted them published. And that we should stop reading if we want to respect his wishes. I almost stopped reading. It was hard to remember that the book is fiction. In fact that should be hard to remember, it should be, because in truth, in the end, it wasn't fiction. This is the most important thing about it. Harrison Shepherd and Violet Brown may never have existed, but these events too place, these things happened to someone. These things still happen to other people now, under other names and guises. It's not fiction. And that is the scariest thing about it.

(less)

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Dec 20, 2009 Lisa rated it 1 of 5 stars

I hated this book. I couldn't even finish it. I started it and had so much trouble reading it that I put it down and didn't even want to pick it back up. Curious, I went to Goodreads to see what other people had said about it. Surprisingly, a lot of people loved it. A couple of people couldn't finish it, but the majority gave it good reviews. So I thought I'd give it another try. Ugh. For the life of me, I couldn't figure out its appeal!!

I just Googled it and found a NPR review that made me feel...more

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Dec 11, 2009 Jeanette rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: all-fiction, mexico, historical-fiction, cultural-and-social-commentary, america

3 1/2 stars

The two sections of this book are different enough that it could almost be reviewed as two separate books. They really are THAT different.
First 275 pages or so = 4 stars
Final 230 pages or so = 2 stars

Kingsolver is at the peak of her descriptive powers in the first part of the book. Her bright, lively detailing of Harrison's early life in Mexico compensates for the patchiness of the narration. Add to that the real characters of Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, and Lev (Leon) Trotsky, and it...more

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Jul 13, 2012 Krista rated it 2 of 5 stars

I tried & tried & tried to like this book...I am a huge Kingsolver fan so I expected it would grow into something wonderful. I liked the beginning, but once the main character was shipped off to the US, I lost total interest. I was already a little irritated by the disjointed, journal style but was enjoying the character's adventures in Mexico. But when he ended up in the US with his weird father & unpleasant characters, I forced myself to finish the first 100 pages & then stoppe...more

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Jan 11, 2010 Nicole rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: anyone willing to make the effort

Shelves: historical-fiction, adult-technically

About a week before I started reading Lacuna, my friend asked me when I thought Barbara Kingsolver was going to write a gay character. Little did we know...

The fascinating part of Shepherd's homosexuality, of his entire character really, is how it is revealed. Slowly, carefully, the way we had to peel away the thinest possible onion skins to put on slides in my 6th grade science class. Most of this story is told through Shepherd's journal entries, entries in which the pronoun "I" is notably lack...more

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Nov 25, 2012 Andy Miller rated it 3 of 5 stars

I usually love Kingsolver's books but I was disappointed with Lacuna. Part of Kingsolver's talent is making you feel like you know her characters and while there was some of that in the beginning and end of The Lacuna, the middle just seemed to drag.

The portion on Trotsky living in Mexico seemed especially weak. From reading the book you would think that Trotsky simply wanted to create a socialist democracy in Russia and if he hadn't been chased from Russia by Stalin, we would have had some sort...more

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Nov 04, 2009 Bridget rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2009-reads

Yep, Barbara Kingsolver does it again, with a book that almost demands that you keep reading. This is the story of Harrison William Shepherd, the son of a Mexican mother, and an American father. The father is indifferent to the boy, and his mother longs for romance and adventure, so she returns to Mexico with the boy.

The book is written as if it is a diary or journal of Harrison's life from his earliest memories. He details his life in Mexico, where through a series of events, he becomes the coo...more

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Jul 09, 2012 thewanderingjew rated it 5 of 5 stars

This book is a powerful exposé of our country’s experiences and eventual recovery from the time of the depression until after World War II, up to and including the McCarthy era. The reminder of the world’s decay and the violent politics of that time made me shudder as I read it.
The book traces the life of a fictitious person, Harrison Shepherd, a rather lost soul, born in the United States of an American father, a government worker, and a Mexican mother of rather loose morals. He is shuttled fr...more This book is a powerful exposé of our country’s experiences and eventual recovery from the time of the depression until after World War II, up to and including the McCarthy era. The reminder of the world’s decay and the violent politics of that time made me shudder as I read it.
The book traces the life of a fictitious person, Harrison Shepherd, a rather lost soul, born in the United States of an American father, a government worker, and a Mexican mother of rather loose morals. He is shuttled from one country to the other, without clearly identifying with either one, Mexico or the United States. He has no anchor to either place. His anchor is to the lacuna*** he discovers as a boy, when his loneliness leads him to become a swimmer and to explore the ocean’s floor. As the story begins, so it ends.
While Harrison Shepherd’s character is made up out of whole cloth, the reader will recognize many of the other characters in the book that lived at that time: Hoover, Churchill, Trotsky, Lenin, Stalin, Kahlo, Rivera, Truman, Nixon, McCarthy and so on. The events in the countries discussed, actually took place.
Illuminated for us by Violet Brown, his stenographer, we learn about the politics of Shepherd’s employers and of the countries they represent. She opens a window into his private life, his sexuality and his thoughts. She leads us on his journey as he tries to survive his haphazard existence, as a young man, in a troubled world. He is largely innocent, naive and unaware of the dangers awaiting him in the outside world.
Alternately during his life he is a plaster mixer for Diego Rivera, a confidante to his artist wife, Frida Kahlo, a secretary to Leon Trotsky, a cook and later on an accomplished novelist in the United States. Shepherd’s journals, diaries, and fictitious correspondence, primarily with Frida Kahlo, lead us on a journey through the period of his life in Mexico, when he lived with his mother and worked for the Riveras, until he was returned to his father in the United States and attended a military school. After that brief sojourn, he returns to Mexico to work again for the Riveras, proceeding from there to work as secretary and cook to Trotsky, the exiled Russian. Later when he again returns to the United States, he becomes an author of some renown, attracting the attention of the Un-American Activities Committee, and finally returns again to Mexico, going back to his lacuna after being disgraced by false innuendo and false accusations.
Kingsolver has done a monumental job of describing the events and atmosphere of those times. All of the heroes and villains of the day are drawn clearly and their emotions and fears are captured perfectly. How difficult it must have been for her, as a writer, to write a story about a writer, and to make that writer have a style of his own, apart from hers, and yet, she did it magnificently.
The first part of the book was the weakest one for me. It was a bit tedious, but after that, the pace picked up and the book branched out connecting fact to fiction and held my interest. Kingsolver has shown how, on several occasions, a few power hungry men, politicians of all stripes, radicals and extremists, came together to alter the course of history. Their extreme views caused panic, fear and ultimately, obedience. The media fanned the flames by printing information regardless of its veracity, because they were not so much concerned with the truth but rather with the size of their audience.
The most frightening message for me, gleaned from this book, was that we are today in the midst of a similar atmosphere in which the politics of division are being ramped up and paraded across front pages of newspapers and a media still intent on readers rather than facts is shaping our history and our world.
Once again we have a political situation in which a leader is allowing the country to be corrupted by false statements, soundbites, inference and fear which tend to incite the country to move in a particular direction and turn against a particular segment of the population. The enemy has changed but the false accusations are the same and the results can be catastrophic. Are we headed down the same shameful road to ignominy that we traveled with McCarthy? As the media and politicians once fanned the flames of hate and fear and closed the minds and mouths of those that disagreed, silencing all opposition, are we not now, with our political correctness echoing those times? In the time of the novel, communism was the ugly enemy, in today’s time, success appears to be the enemy, as class warfare is encouraged and waged against innocent, successful people, a situation promoted and worsened by the media and politicians of all stripes. Is truth stranger than fiction or is art imitating life? Once, speaking out against government policies was likely to falsely brand you as a communist, today, doing the same, will likely falsely brand you as a racist. I don’t think either policy is worthy of this country! This book was published in 2009. Perhaps it needs to be reissued again.
***For purposes of this book, the lacuna, which refers to something secret, has many meanings.

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Jun 25, 2010 Alex rated it 1 of 5 stars

Placed in context with Kingsolver's other books this is essentially worthless. She turns Freida Kahlo into the most magical pixie dream girl ever and gives us a main character so thoroughly desexed and generally grey that one sort of imagines him as a Ken doll, completely generic and non-threating in every possible way. And I KNOW that's sort of the point of the main character, but still, he is pretty much one of the least enjoyable protagonists I've ever read since all you do is spend time with...more

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Oct 16, 2011 Carmen added it · review of another edition

While I thoroughly enjoyed The Poisonwood Bible I have huge problems with this book. Even though the book is fiction there are historical facts that have been included and it is indeed terrible when she makes so many mistakes. On page 56, she talks about the one fifth booty part that Cortes was to send to the Extremely Catholic Majesty the Queen. When this Queen, Isabel La Catolica, died in 1504, Cortes did not arrive in Mexico before 1519 and he wrote to and shared the booty with Carlos V The E...more

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May 19, 2011 Julie Suzanne rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: art, historical-fiction

I had the privilege of listening to Kingsolver read this aloud as well as reading the print...I love her. Her voice and her style of narration, her perfectly articulated words and sounds all captivated me instantly. Hearing V.B.'s voice as Kingsolver intended it is what made me want to just hug Violet Brown. The characters were so lovable (even though I'd never want to hang out with Harrison or Violet in real life, but Trotsky definitely).

I have heard people say that this book had a political ag...more

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Jan 10, 2012 JZ NJ rated it 5 of 5 stars

Became a 'huge Kingsolver fan in the mid 90's when I read "The Bean Trees", and "Lacuna" did not disappoint. Sometimes books come along at the right time, I had seen the Frida Kahlo exhibit at the Philly Art Museum, and of course, watched the movie again. So last year I picked up "Lacuna" and embraced it all, the art, the politics, and learned about the Monument Men, the military art experts who helped pack and move our art treasures from Washington DC to the Biltmore in Asheville! This amazed m...more

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Feb 09, 2011 Brian rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Kingsolver's best book since The Poisonwood Bible, The Lacuna is the story of a diffident, unassuming man who is thrust unwillingly onto the centre stage of history. Harrison Shepherd, is born in America but raised in Mexico by his half American, half Mexican mother, a woman who is temperamentally discontented with her position in society and is always seeking to improve it through a series of affairs with married men.

As a youth, Harrison becomes involved with the painters Diego Rivera and Frid...more

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Nov 04, 2012 Book Concierge rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: lovers of literary fiction

Audio book performed by the author.
4****

Kingsolver tells the story of William Harrison Shepherd, a young man caught in the gaps (the lacunae) between two countries, two parents, two cultures, two lives (public and private). The novel unfolds as a series of diary entries, letters, and newspaper clippings, spanning the period from 1929 to 1954. Never quite at ease with his place in the world, Shepherd is an astute observer, who carefully considers what he witnesses and forms his own opinions. But...more

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Oct 29, 2012 miriam rated it 5 of 5 stars

This is a rather unique book whose meaning is not wholly revealed, at least for me, until the end. The writing is superb, and the irony and humor expressed by the central character from boyhood to age 34 is delightful.

Historical events and people of the 1930s and 40s provide a significant backdrop for the story, but it is hard to know what to believe. One wonders how inventive Kingsolver is being for the sake of a story and to express a point of view. Nevertheless, the historial context is an i...more

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Aug 12, 2011 Barry McCulloch rated it 2 of 5 stars

The Lacuna is such a difficult book to review, it being several books in one. Indeed, the narrative flows through three decades, two countries and two narrators. I'm in two minds with this book. It ended really well with McCarthyism beginning to bite and likewise started brilliantly with Shepherd growing up on an island and moving on to work in the households of Rivera & Trotsky.

However, there is a large section (the majority of his stay in the US) in which I totally lost interest and actua...more

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May 19, 2011 Ramey rated it 5 of 5 stars

while i was reading this book, i didn't want to let it out of my physical presence. i kept it by the bed, in my hand on the bart, near my computer at work. i asked my girlfriend if she was jealous that i just wanted to hold this book, at all times. that's how powerful i found kingsolver's story to be,,, during the week or so that i had the privilege of sinking into her unbelievably strong narrative, i wanted to be nowhere else, at all.

the upshot of the book is as follows,,, barbara kingsolver ta...more

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Jul 06, 2010 Aylin rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: bookmarks-mag, fiction, fiction-historical, by-of-in-mexico, by-of-in-usa, by-of-in-latin-south-america

I really liked the first part (roughly half) of this book about a boy (Harrison)who is being raised by a mother who eeks out an existence by sponging off the men she manages to ensnare. The setting is 1930's Mexico. Mexican artists Diego Rivera and his wife Frida Kahlo are an integral part of the story, as is Lev Trotsky (leader of the Bolshevik Revolution and Rivera's friend and houseguest).

The second half of the book completely switches gears. The setting is Asheville NC where Harrison is liv...more

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Nov 14, 2009 Todd Libasci rated it 4 of 5 stars

The Lacuna, while not the equal of the excellent The Poisonwood Bible, comes close to matching its predecessor. There are numerous similarities. Both novels place "ordinary" people in the context of extraordinary historical figures (in the case of The Lacuna, not just the context but the household) and events. While The Lacuna lacks the near-perfect structure of The Poisonwood Bible (hereafter, "TPB"), the book coheres around its title, which alludes to an underwater cave but also to missing not...more The Lacuna, while not the equal of the excellent The Poisonwood Bible, comes close to matching its predecessor. There are numerous similarities. Both novels place "ordinary" people in the context of extraordinary historical figures (in the case of The Lacuna, not just the context but the household) and events. While The Lacuna lacks the near-perfect structure of The Poisonwood Bible (hereafter, "TPB"), the book coheres around its title, which alludes to an underwater cave but also to missing notebooks written by the narrator, Harrison Shepherd, and to the ending, which I will not reveal. Like TPB, The Lacuna laments - mocks, even - American anti-communist paranoia, showing how too many let that paranoia run roughshod over what at least many of us regard as fundamental American values.

Needless to say, not all readers will share Kingsolver's reading of history. I know someone who wouldn't see Spike Lee's Malcolm X because it didn't portray the title character in a completely negative light. Such a reader may not be willing to read The Lacuna because of the nearly avuncular Trotsky, just as (if the customer reviews on Amazon are any indication) he couldn't read TPB for its portrayal of Lumumba or Neto. So be it, but Kingsolver puts a compelling person behind the scary, pointy beard. (Hmmm, didn't Lumumba have a scary, pointy beard too? I see a trend here.)

I wonder if Kingsolver's Red Scare is meant to suggest the anti-Muslim paranoia of latter days, in the same way that The Crucible uses Salem as a metaphor for the Red Scare. In The Lacuna, Americans seem to regard communism as a kind of communicable disease, and cf. the 2008 American presidential campaign for a similar regard of Islam, during which the rhyme of Obama and Osama was held in some circles to actually mean something.

I mentioned TPB's near-perfect structure. The structure of The Lacuna is, to say the least, eclectic, including Shepherd's notebook musings, his letters to Frida Kahlo, fan letters (and later letters of rebuke) from the public, clippings of newspaper stories, book reviews, supplemental material written by his faithful secretary Violet Brown, and a congressional hearing transcript. The newspaper stories are by far the most disruptive, but they do set the historical context without having to force it into the mouths of the book's characters. Somehow, though, the structure seems well-matched to the story.

Shepherd's homosexuality is portrayed with the utmost respect. At first I thought that Arthur Gold, his attorney, was more blasé about it than would have been expected in the 1950's, but then again, Artie WAS an entertainment attorney. Tom Cuddy, Shepherd's occasional lover, is not so much un homme flambé as a pathological beatnik, his speech compulsively peppered with hipster slang. Recalling Rachel Price in TPB, I wonder if The Character With A Verbal Tic is going to be a mainstay of Kingsolver's oeuvre, like John Irving's bears and flatulent dogs.

I thought the scenes between Shepherd and Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera and Trotsky were pulled off without a false note. The only false note I could detect, in fact, is in Shepherd's testimony before HUAC. I find it hard to believe that an agoraphobe such as Shepherd, one with everything to lose, would be quite so sanguine, even flippant, in that tight a spot. I respect him, but honestly, I don't think he had the huevos for that.

Lacking the ability to enter 4-1/2 stars, I'll round up to 5.(less)

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Jul 22, 2012 Rachel rated it 3 of 5 stars

3.5 stars

I read this because a friend loaned it to me. Historical fiction is near the bottom of my list of preferred reading so my expectations were not high. The first section and the very end of the book I liked a lot. The middle was a lot of the Kingsolver on a soapbox and not being very subtle, that we get eyefulls of in "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" (which she was working on at the same time as this book). However, with the exception of the aforementioned soapboxing, some slow sections in th...more

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Jan 04, 2010 Jess rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobook, historical-fiction, adult-fiction

Here is a story where the characters and setting shine through, with an audio version that's soft but draws you in. After 16 CDs of Kingsolver's voice, I find myself thinking in her rendition of Violet Brown, with a Carolina accent and old-fashioned sentence structure. My stars. The only fault I find is with the plot - after the movement and tension of the early part of the story, Shepherd's years in the US lose momentum. The Cold War implications feel inevitable, and the many newspaper clipping...more

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Dec 27, 2009 Gini rated it 3 of 5 stars

Recommended to Gini by: saw a television review

I saw a review of this book on television that made me buy it the next day. I'd not read Kingsolver before, but the first part of the story took place in Mexico, in the homes of Frida Khalo, Diego Rivera and Trotsky-- and I've been to those houses several times and was looking forward to reading about the people who had lived in them. I enjoyed the first half of the book very much, but the second half -- after so much color and action -- fell flat. Most of the story unfolded as rather obvious co...more

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Oct 21, 2010 Patty rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: readin10

I don't give a book the 5 stars without much consideration. This author's beautiful language and the things she taught me make Lacuna very special to me.
I found myself in the bright and colorful world of Frida Kahlo's Mexico, and the gloomy sphere of the iron curtain and our country's disturbing consequences of McCarthyism. A real work of art that took me away from my cozy home.
It's not a quick read or one you can put down without considering all the circumstances of all the main characters. Hop...more

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Nov 04, 2009 MK Brunskill-Cowen rated it 5 of 5 stars

Is there anyone who writes with such beauty as Barbara Kingsolver? She has an ability to transform the reader from reading on a dreary porch to Isla Pixol, Mexico of the 1930s to Asheville, North Carolina of the 1940s. To transform someone from a beloved novelist to a scourge to be abhorred overnight. The Lacuna is about Harrison Shepherd, son of a Mexican woman and a US government official, who belonged to both countries, yet not to either of them. He wound up working for Diego Rivera and Frida...more

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Feb 15, 2011 Anita S rated it 5 of 5 stars

I loved this book. I enjoyed the intertwining of history and fiction and the way the author breathed life into characters such as Frieda Kahlo and Trotsky. Mexican history and customs were revealed along with American history as seen through the writings and adventures os Harrison Shepherd from the age of 12 in 1929 until the 1950's. Great story, well written!

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Nov 04, 2009 Candace rated it 5 of 5 stars

This is quite the novel, as full and satisfying as anything I've read in some time. Its picture of Mexico in the 30's is spot on, and the characters of Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo, and Lev Trotsky feel fresh and sharp.

The political correctness which bored me in Barbara Kingsolver's novels seem naive has developed--she's showing, not preaching. A wonderful read by an author who is at her best.

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Nov 04, 2009 Karen rated it 5 of 5 stars

The only disappointing thing about this book was that I finished it, and have no new Kingsolver books to look forward to.

As always, her writing is exquisite. I found myself re-reading parts just to savor her use of language.

The Lacuna is a novel based on real events in history--the Mexican artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo and the period in the 1930's when Trotsky was exiled in Mexico. I learned a lot while enjoying a good story, not really sure where it was heading--but oh! does it come tog...more

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Dec 28, 2009 Janet rated it 5 of 5 stars

The best book I have read this year.This historical novel tells the story of a boy with an American father,Mexican mother,follows him thru Mexico in the 1930's and then to North Carolina in the 1950's.

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Apr 03, 2013 Claire added it · review of another edition

This novel, made up of journal entries, newspaper clippings, and personal letters has the power to transport the reader from colourful haciendas in Mexico, to America, and back.

Barbara Kingsolver has achieved a literary feat in this historical novel that explores a range of themes. Introduced to Harrison Shepherd, the author of the journals and letters that forms the basis of this book, as a child, the reader bears witness to the maturation of this young man through his writing. As the book goe...more This novel, made up of journal entries, newspaper clippings, and personal letters has the power to transport the reader from colourful haciendas in Mexico, to America, and back.

Barbara Kingsolver has achieved a literary feat in this historical novel that explores a range of themes. Introduced to Harrison Shepherd, the author of the journals and letters that forms the basis of this book, as a child, the reader bears witness to the maturation of this young man through his writing. As the book goes on, these writings become almost a discarded history (if not for his stenographer, Violet Brown).

The result is a sincere account of a young man’s story – one that leads him into the house of Diego Rivera and Frieda Kahlo, where a lifelong friendship with this extraordinary woman develops. He becomes secretary and cook within the household and his services are retained for an exiled Lev Trotsky. The atmosphere is set as a time bomb of emotions and politics, as these powerful characters are recorded by Shepherd the scribe.

As if by osmosis, and in the wake of tragedy, Shepherd moves to America, towards its hopefulness, in order to start a new life. But, throughout the book, the reader is alerted to the fact that Shepherd is a strong, solitary character – looking for his place in the world, yet relishing its loneliness in some respects; using a life of passion to harness his deepest dreams. And yet, in acquiring fame, he still yearns for invisibility, and history repeats itself as he is now the underdog who has made it big – being misquoted and misrepresented by newspapermen.

Rather than being the land of possibility Shepherd had initially hoped, America is evolving into a land of paranoia and Cold War suspicion; where, like the surrealists and muralists, of dreams and politics, popularity wanes and grows based on the whims of the times. It is a piece of modern history this young author unwittingly parallels with ancient Aztec society in his novels of historical fiction. Truth and presumption merge and then suddenly are in conflict – something that makes for superbly interesting reading.

‘The Lacuna’ is filled with themes that are explored, left, and later revisited in fluid, detailed writing. It is heavy with symbols. If I have any advice for readers thinking of delving into this book, it would be to allow yourself the time to read it slowly and consistently. Kingsolver has created a rich story, a tapestry of events that is a very human mix of optimism and tragedy. And yet, when you reach the end, you can feel the lacuna – the gap in the manuscript that leaves an unquenchable sense of incompleteness, the gap between the rocks under Mexican waters that leads to who knows where.
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Jul 30, 2012 Michael rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, historical-fiction, gay, mexico, art, north-carolina, biographical-fiction, communism, cold-war

Great read that satisfies on several levels. A key pleasure is Kingsolver's prose, which shines as we would expect from her track record of essays and novels about rural folks in Appalachia and the Southwest. It also satisfies as a coming of age tale of a half-Mexican, half-American boy, Harrison Shepherd, raised by his mother on an island near Vera Cruz and later transferred to the care of his father, who dumps him in a boarding school in Washington, DC. He seeks solace from his emotional isola...more

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About Barbara Kingsolver

Barbara Kingsolver is an American novelist, essayist, and poet. She was raised in rural Kentucky and lived briefly in Africa 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 most famous works include The Poisonwood Bible, the tale of a missionary family in the Congo,...more Barbara Kingsolver is an American novelist, essayist, and poet. She was raised in rural Kentucky and lived briefly in Africa 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 most famous 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. Each of her books published since 1993 have been on The New York Times Best Seller list. Kingsolver has received numerous awards, including the UK's Orange Prize for Fiction 2010, for The Lacuna and the National Humanities Medal. She has been nominated for the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Pulitzer Prize.

In 2000, Kingsolver established the Bellwether Prize to support "literature of social change."

Kingsolver was born in Annapolis, Maryland in 1955 and grew up in Carlisle in rural Kentucky. When Kingsolver was seven years old, her father, a physician, took the family to the former Republic of Congo in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Her parents worked in a public health capacity, and the family lived without electricity or running water.

After graduating from high school, Kingsolver attended DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana on a music scholarship, studying classical piano. Eventually, however, she changed her major to biology when she realized that "classical pianists compete for six job openings a year, and the rest of [them:] get to play 'Blue Moon' in a hotel lobby." She was involved in activism on her campus, and took part in protests against the Vietnam war. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science in 1977, and moved to France for a year before settling in Tucson, Arizona, where she would live for much of the next two decades. In 1980 she enrolled in graduate school at the University of Arizona, where she earned a Master's degree in ecology and evolutionary biology.

Kingsolver began her full-time writing career in the mid 1980s as a science writer for the university, which eventually lead to some freelance feature writing. She began her career in fiction writing after winning a short story contest in a local Phoenix newspaper. In 1985 she married Joseph Hoffmann; their daughter Camille was born in 1987. She moved with her daughter to Tenerife in the Canary Islands for a year during the first Gulf war, mostly due to frustration over America's military involvement. After returning to the US in 1992, she separated from her husband.

In 1994, Kingsolver was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from her alma mater, DePauw University. She was also married to Steven Hopp, that year, and their daughter, Lily, was born in 1996. In 2004, Kingsolver moved with her family to a farm in Washington County, Virginia, where they currently reside. In 2008, she received an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Duke University, where she delivered a commencement address entitled "How to be Hopeful".

In a 2010 interview with The Guardian, Kingsolver says, "I never wanted to be famous, and still don't, [...:] the universe rewarded me with what I dreaded most." She says created her own website just to compete with a plethora of fake ones, "as a defence to protect my family from misinformation. Wikipedia abhors a vacuum. If you don't define yourself, it will get done for you in colourful ways."(less)

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“The most important thing about a person is always the thing you don't know.” — 73 people liked it

“Memories do not always soften with time; some grow edges like knives.” — 44 people liked it

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