Animal Dreams

by Barbara Kingsolver

book data

10,424 ratings, 3.95 average rating, 614 reviews (more data...)

rating	frequency	%
5		28%
4		42%
3		24%
2		3%
1		0%

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published

August 1st 1991 (first published 1987) by Harper Perennial

binding

Paperback, 352 pages

isbn

0060921145 (isbn13: 9780060921149)

description

"Animals dream about the things they do in the day time just like people do. If you want sweet dreams, you've got to live a sweet life." So

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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 12,284)

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04/05/08

Doc Opp rated it:

I was a bit disturbed that I could appreciate this book. While I have liked a lot of Kingsolver's other work, this particular book is centered around the sort of seriously damaged character that usually turns me off to a book. And had I read this in high school, or college, or maybe even grad school, I'm fairly certain I would have disliked it tremendously.

And yet... having read it when I did, I was able to identify with some elements of the what the character was experiencing, eve...more

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09/16/07

Meghan rated it:

Read in May, 2008

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

My memory, like Codi's, is for shit. I have very few memories -- from childhood through this week -- that aren't factually suspect, and thus justifiably subject to correction by others. This is either sad or liberating, depending on my mood and motivation, and provides both impetus for and against the writing down of Real Life. Sometimes the only proof I want is the emotional residue. But sometimes that, too, is inaccurate -- like the blinding "pop" in Codi's recurring dream, even the ...more

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03/27/08

Cat rated it:

(review of isbn 0613032950)

Read in April, 2008

This is only the second book that I've read by Barbara Kingsolver, and I'm very interested in learning about her writing process. She has this infectious, cultural curiosity that drives her to learn anything and everything about a place and its people...even if they only exist in her mind. She creates an entire world of history, geography, lineage and folklore.

And every character is filled with so much wisdom and humor that I feel like I was given a sneak peak into Kingsolver's p...more

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11/02/08

Wfbcreeds rated it:

bookshelves: bookclub

"Animals dream about the things they do in the day time just like people do. If you want sweet dreams, you've got to live a sweet life." So says Loyd Peregrina, a handsome Apache trainman and latter-day philosopher. But when Codi Noline returns to her hometown, Loyd's advice is painfully out of her reach. Dreamless and at the end of her rope, Codi comes back to Grace, Arizona to confront her past and face her ailing, distant father. What the finds is a town threatened by a silent envir...more

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07/23/07

Lindsay rated it:

bookshelves: barbarakingsolvermadnesssss, reread-ing

Read in May, 2006

In a letter to Codi, Hallie writes, "'What keeps you going isn't some fine destination but just the road you're on, and the fact that you know how to drive.'" This is not a love story as the back of the book may have you believe. Sure, people fall in and out of love within its pages, but this book is really about understanding oneself amid a lifetime of memories and secrets...the risks we take not only when we cheat ourselves, but when we find ourselves, too. I read this for the fir...more

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12/03/07

Joyce rated it:

Read in January, 2008

This was a pleasant, "chick lit" kind of read and I can't, for the life of me," figure out why the community where I live chose it as a community read. The most I got out of this tale is a desire to visit Arizona. It's a nice story and I liked the central character and her boyfriend, but I fail to see any deep meanings which would resonate with the whole Midwestern county where I live. There's an environmental subplot that is amusingly and deftly handled, but it's not central to t...more

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06/29/07

Z rated it:

This is the Kalamazoo Public Library's Reading Together 2008 book, and I would highly recommend it. It deals with family issues, Alzheimer's, environmental issues, political issues (specifically Nicaragua in the 1980's), and Native American issues, yet it is not an "issue book." It is a captivating story of a 30-something woman who returns to her small hometown and struggles with opening herself up to life. That may make it sound sappy, but it's not, because Cosima, our protagonist ...more

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10/20/07

Dana D. rated it:

This is my favorite Kingsolver novel, and I've re-read it several times, not because it's the best "literature" but because I loved several the characters and some of the imagery... I even named my cat after the main character's sister. Sort of. Anyway, it's readable in a day or two; it's a little preachy and the plot is contrived, but of great sentimental value to me. And the scene of Cody's aging father developing black and white photographs meant to resemble completely unrelated...more

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08/04/07

Vrinda rated it:

bookshelves: fiction

Read in July, 2007

This is a pretty good novel from the author of The Poisonwood Bible. It has some really beautiful writing, and quirky characters, but it a little bit slow moving. A lot on sisterhood, the American southwest, nature, changing and growing. The narrator (Codi) isn't as much of a risk-taker as her sister Hallie (just off to Nicaragua), but still has some interesting changes and issues to work out. Not too serious, there are definitely subtly humorous and light-hearted thoughts and scenes in this...more

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12/03/08

Leslie rated it:

I stayed up late tonight finishing this book. I just bought the book 2 days ago at a used bookstore. This was an uncharacteristically fast read for me. I read like I eat - slowly and often distracted. I've been sobbing (not crying, SOBBING) through the last half of the book. I'm just getting over a nasty cold and it definitely wasn't pretty.

Kingsolver writing is so earthy, playful and gorgeous at the same time. She weaves in these metaphors about globalism and environmentalism (in t...more

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01/21/09

Alina rated it:

Read in January, 2009

(If I didn't know who the author was, I would have loved this book. Unfortunately, Barbara Kingsolver has blown me away too many times to be able to settle for 'just' a good book. I know -- I'm so unfair in my ratings, but so be it!)
The book was very romantic. It show-cased the many varieties of love -- parental-child, romantic, sisterly bond -- and it was done so, so well. I really sympathized with Codi in all of her relationships, and could literally feel her frustration with life and li...more

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01/02/09

Zoe rated it:

(review of isbn 0613032950)

Read in January, 2009

I found this at Brattleboro Books, the used bookstore in town, and thought that if I actually bought it, maybe I would finally read it. I've checked it out of three different libraries now at least five times, but somehow have always been too distracted to get into it. I have paid enough library fines because of this to have paid for my used copy several times, I'm sure. But ohhh my. This was perfect. My (early-)mid-winter desert escape.
How do these things find us just when we need them? I...more

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06/03/09

Kelly rated it:

Read in June, 2009

from: http://litmed.med.nyu.edu/Annotation?act...

Cosima Nolinas (Codi) trained as a physician, but decided during her residency to give up medicine. As the novel opens, she is returning to her hometown, Grace, Arizona, to teach high school biology and care for her physician father, Doc Homero, who is suffering from Alzheimer's disease. Her younger sister, Hallie, has just left for Nicaragua to help with agricultural development. Codi's journey back to where she grew up reinforces a s...more from: http://litmed.med.nyu.edu/Annotation?act...

Cosima Nolinas (Codi) trained as a physician, but decided during her residency to give up medicine. As the novel opens, she is returning to her hometown, Grace, Arizona, to teach high school biology and care for her physician father, Doc Homero, who is suffering from Alzheimer's disease. Her younger sister, Hallie, has just left for Nicaragua to help with agricultural development. Codi's journey back to where she grew up reinforces a sense of aimlessness which she attributes to the death of her mother when she was three years old, to the miscarriage of an unwanted pregnancy when she was fifteen, and to her father's remoteness. She intends her stay to be temporary.

But gradually she is drawn into the community. She restarts a relationship with Loyd [sic:] Peregrina, the Native-American father--though she never told him--of the child she lost in high school. She joins the town's struggle against a mining company that has polluted the town's water supply and now plans to dam the river. As her father's condition deteriorates, she learns more about the history of his connection with the town and, by examining the results of a life-long study he has done on a genetic anomaly affecting children born to second-generation inhabitants of Grace, she learns that her own hereditary background is far more deeply rooted in the town than she had known.

Codi's narrative is interspersed with her father's confused but illuminating memories of her childhood, and with the letters she receives from Hallie, who has always been the motivated and determined sister. When Hallie is kidnapped and then murdered by the contras, Codi's first response is to run away once more, but in laying her sister to rest and telling Loyd about their lost child, she realizes that she has found her home and--in her fierce and practical education of the new generation of Grace adolescents--her purpose.
Commentary

Set against the chilling ecological and social effects of corporate and political exploitation, this deftly-structured novel tells a story about personal obstacles to giving care, and about the role of action--and activism--in overcoming those obstacles. Doc Homer's difficult social position (his family were town pariahs) and the loss of his wife leave him able to express care for his patients more easily than for his children.

Hallie is almost involuntarily driven in her commitment to what Codi enviously calls "saving the world," but is outraged when Codi expresses this, and accuses her of using her own lack of self-esteem as an excuse for being selfish: "You think you're no good, so you can't do good things." As Codi becomes more and more committed to doing good things in the aptly-named town of Grace, the fear of doing harm that made her give up medicine is replaced by a peace that comes from relinquishing her insecure individuality for absorption in a community(less)

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04/01/09

Bucket rated it:

bookshelves: reviewed

Read in August, 2008

Codi returns home to AZ to teach high school and take care of her father. Alternating perspectives (Codi and her father). Codi's sister (Hallie) goes to Nicaragua to teach sustainable farming and is killed by Contras. The town in Arizona fights against the mines that are polluting their water Codi rethinks here attitudes towards life and love and gains a new perspective.

Themes: political issues, biology/nature imagery, family secrets and growth, multi-culturalism

I lik...more

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06/07/09

Debbie rated it:

Read in June, 2009

Of all the Kingsolver books I've read, this is probably my least favorite, but even so it's a "good read." There are powerful images and fascinating descriptions, and I always find her science and environmental agenda fascinating. (I know this is not universal....) When she tells the story from the father's point of view, I am always touched. As Codi, though, I am sometimes less convinced. Maybe it's an attempt to show that one can't be both a detached observer and a participant in li...more

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08/09/08

Annie rated it:

(review of isbn 006016350X)

bookshelves: environmental, fiction

Read in August, 2008

This is still one of my favorite books to go back and read again and again. It's also the only pleasure book we brought to Costa Rica. I'm wondering how many times I'll read it...

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02/19/08

Lisa rated it:

Read in February, 2008

Fabulous book! Loved the relationship of the sisters in this book. Made me want to snatch my sister up and keep her in my pocket.

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12/11/08

Mishmash rated it:

Read in November, 2008

I loved this book. Her writing style was extremely insightful, honest and human.
There were 2 pages that were so endearing that I needed to make a special note
to go back to them, pg.205 and pg.231,
favorite quotes: "I feel small and ridiculous and hemmed in on every side by the need to be safe." - "What keeps you going isn't some final destination but just the road you're on, and the fact that you know how to drive... the very least you can do in your life is figure o...more

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04/21/09

Emily rated it:

bookshelves: fiction, sciencey, spiritual

Read in April, 2009

I read this in Northern New Mexico in the book's described landscape. Incredible. The protagonist's (Cosima) journey back to her hometown to rediscover her past, and her family, and her hope for herself is both heartbreaking and inspiring. I cried the entire last hour I read the book. It felt like I was breaking and healing right along with the characters. To me, that's the sign of an excellent piece of fiction. Highly recommended...especially for the earth lovers, southwest lovers, native/indig...more

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01/30/09

Christine rated it:

bookshelves: decent-fiction

Read in April, 2009

Codi is an intelligent woman surrounded by people who love her, yet is focused on her back story of being a loner and outcast. When emotional discomfort rears its head, her reaction is to always pick up and move.

As a 30-something medical school drop out who has just separated with her boyfriend of many years, it's time to move on - again. She's going back to her hometown of Grace to teach for a semester and care for her father, who has Alzheimer's. Codi is in for much more than she s...more

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"At some point in my life I'd honestly hoped love would rescue me from the cold, drafty castle I lived in. But at another point, much earlier I think, I'd quietly begun to hope for nothing at all in the way of love, so as not to be disappointed. It works. It gets to be a habit." More quotes...