Short Reviews: THE SERVICEBERRY; THE VEGETARIAN; DEATH IN THE JUNGLE

Eek! I was a reading fiend this summer and not a reviewing fiend. Today I looked through the list of all the books I haven't reviewed. I apologized to some of them which I won't review, and determined I did have at least a few words I'd like to say about these books.

The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Scribner, 2024. 120 pages.

I enjoyed Braiding Sweetgrass by Wall Kimmerer when I read it two years ago. I saw The Serviceberry on the shelves of my local bookstore but I assumed, without picking it up, it was just an illustrated gift book version of the first, so I didn't need to read it. I was wrong. I was looking for a book about economics for a reading challenge and this was on the list of suggested titles.

In The Serviceberry, Wall Kimmerer, an indigenous biologist, considers the ethics of reciprocity in a gift economy as she harvest berries next to the birds who are eating them (and spreading the seeds for future plants.) A gift economy is one where everyone has enough and doesn't take more than they need. Sharing out of abundance (think about your zucchinis and tomatoes this time of year) rather than hoarding what you have while others have to struggle to get by. This is what happens in the capitalistic form of economics which is based on scarcity and each man for himself.  “Serviceberries show us another model, one based upon reciprocity, where wealth comes from the quality of your relationships, not from the illusion of self-sufficiency.”

Both my husband and I were very touched by this short book. It's descriptions of ways we can move to a more gift or spirit-filled economy brought us hope for our future. 

Here is the first serviceberry plant I saw on our hike in Montana. Since the fruit wasn't ripe in June I had to identify the plant by its leaves.

On a related but a side note, this summer I saw my first serviceberry plant, with its unripe fruit, in the mountains of Montana, where huckleberries are king. I was standing over the plant trying to figure out if what I was seeing was a huckleberry plant and my son-in-law pointed out the leaves were all wrong. That led me to do some investigation when we returned from our hike, and I discovered I had been hovering over a serviceberry bush. This realization made me think of the book I'd neglected to pick up at the bookstore, The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer. Everything in my brain always seems to circle back to books. Ha!

My rating: 5 stars.

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The Vegetarian by Han Kang, translated from Korean by Deborah Smith

Hogarth, 2007. 188 pages.

Yeong-hye lives with her husband and has a typical marriage. Waking from a nightmare one morning she renounces eating meat as a way to purge the blood and brutality in her mind. First her husband and then her sister, and eventually her whole family gets involved, trying to force her to stop the nonsense and return to eating meat. This has disastrous effects, not only for Yeong-hye but also for her marriage, and for her relationships within her family. "Celebrated by critics around the world, The Vegetarian is a darkly allegorical, Kafka-esque tale of power, obsession, and one woman’s struggle to break free from the violence both without and within her."

As you can see from the cover, Han Kang won the Nobel Prize for her writings, including The Vegetarian. I, unbelievably, had never even heard of the book or the author until last November during the Novellas in November challenge when it was brought to my attention by another participant. I didn't care for the book at all, though I admit the writing was gripping. The story was so bleak and all the characters so awful. But the description of it being Kafkaesque are so true. The story was so surreal and disorienting. For this reason, I am glad I read it, but it is unlikely I will ever tell anyone else to read it.

My rating: 3 stars.

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Death in the Jungle: Murder, Betrayal, and the Lost Dream of Jonestown by Candace Fleming

Anne Schwartz Books, 2025. 346 pages.

It has almost been 50 years since the notorious Jim Jones persuaded 900 of his followers to drink cyanide-laced punch and commit "revolutionary suicide" in the jungle of Guyana. But how did he do it?

Using first-person accounts, author Candace Fleming reveals many details of Jim Jones' upbringing during the Depression, his founding of a church, The Peoples Temple, based on the promises of equality and justice in first Indianapolis, then California, and finally in the jungles of South America.Also detailed were all the mind-control techniques he used to attract and keep devoted followers, even willing to kill themselves to show their ultimate devotion to him. Among the survivors of that tragic massacre was Steven Jones, Jim Jones son, who stood up to his father over and over again, but was unable to stop the tragedy from happening in the end.

The other day I told my sister some of the details I learned from the book and described how this was not just an indictment of dumb people who followed a nefarious cult leader. But how this is a story of good-hearted people who were attracted to the ideals and then drawn in by the community, and eventually ended up unable to leave it, even though many tried. As I was describing all this to my sister, my husband, who was listening in, chirped up and said. "We're all suckers for books and shows about cults." Yes. But this booked helped me see beyond the cult. It also spoke to me of human needs and how government/churches/society often treat people very unjustly and how people crave to be part of something bigger than themselves. Think about Trump and his MAGA hordes. He does awful things, like Jones who used drugs and had sex with many women, and his followers lower their own standards to still be in agreement with him. It is frightening to think about. People are so easily led astray.

As a YA nonfiction title I did spend a bit of time thinking about Death in the Jungle in teenager hands. I worry it is a bit long for that population at 346 pages. Would teenagers have the patience to digest so much information on one topic, unless, like my husband, they are fascinated by cults? I'm just not sure. I had the hardest time getting teens to read any nonfiction in my library but I think if a librarian really sold it, they would find it as interesting and revealing as I did.

My rating; 4.25 stars.

-Anne