A Quitter's Paradise

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One of Kingsolver’s major themes, hit a little too insistently, is the contempt felt by participants in the modern capitalist economy for those rooted in older ways of life. This pattern of lying and hiding started when she was a teenager, telling her parents she won second place in a science fair when in reality the judges were unimpressed with her entry.

While the first part of the novel is written tightly, it starts to unspool more and more in ever widening circles as it progresses. We also follow from the viewpoints of each of her parents in Taipei before they came to the US, before having had any children, and from Eleanor's sister's vantage point. I was more interested in the POV of Eleanor Liu, the main character who hides lots of secrets and has a troubled relationship with her mother even after her passing, and I wish we had the chance to follow her a bit more into her present and her future choices (will she stay with her husband?As Eleanor’s avoidance of her feelings results in a series of outrageous—often hilarious—choices, her actions begin to threaten all she holds most dear. The story switches and jumps rather abruptly back and forth between timeline ; the present, Eleanor's childhood and her parents' migration. There's a sense of desperation in this book, to have something solely your own, when it seems like at every turn life makes a grab for something. He may not find the precise answer, but his quest for it, in Go’s elegant and incisive prose, is perpetually captivating. The death of Eleanor’s mother has her questioning everything—her childhood, her marriage, her career.

The floundering in science and in romance, certain bits of wry prose, and Eleanor’s quirkiness and emotional stuntedness also reminded me of CHEMISTRY. Overall, the chaos was entertaining to read however I do feel the book fell short of discussing a very real concept of finding peace and paradise after leaving behind something that does not serve you and where you do not feel adequately understood or supported.I walked away contemplating the mediocrity that permeates life and the drudgery of getting through it.