World Reading Project, Book #5
Barbados
Redemption in Indigo, by Karen Lord, 2010
The story is about Paama, an amazing cook who marries a man so gluttonous he's stealing and disgracing himself. The djombi have been observing Paama, and impressed with her, they give her the Chaos Stick, which has the power to manipulate probabilities, making unlikely things happen.
Oh my God, I loved this book. It's been one of my favorite books of the year. I loved the spider trickster character, who was both creeeepy and funny. This book kept surprising me in the directions that it took. There's a lot of compassion in it and by the end of the book my opinions about the "villains" were transformed. I also enjoyed the story telling voice of the narrator, who frequently gives opinions or breaks into the story in other ways. I got this out from the library, but if I ever see it in a bookstore, I'll definitely purchase it.
This is one quote that made me laugh out loud:
"I know your complaint already. You are saying, how do two grown men begin to see talking spiders after only three glasses of spice spirit? My answer to that is twofold. First, you have no idea how strong spice spirit is made in that region. Second, you have no idea how talking animals operate. Do you think they would have survived long if they regularly made themselves known? For that matter, do you think an arachnid with mouthparts is capable of articulating the phrase ‘I am a pawnbroker’ in any known human language? Think! These creatures do not truly talk, nor are they truly animals, but they do encounter human folk, and when they do, they carefully take with them all memory of the meeting."
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