The best multicultural novels set in exotic lands

The Poisonwood Bible is Barbara Kingsolver's best! An evangelical missionary moves his family to a remote village in the Congo during a stormy time in history. The Americans are unprepared not just for throngs of ants & parasites, but predators “red of tooth & claw.” There is no toilet nor running water and his wife Orleanna must fetch and boil water for food and hygiene. The perils and privation are amplified by the husband’s insensitivity to his family’s welfare and to the villagers he has come “to save.” His coldhearted, obsessive nature escalates as political and racial tensions mount in a climax I must not give away! 

(I lived in the tropics and witnessed naïve foreigners try to live off the land and succumb to disease and hardship with their young children.)

I met Alan Brennert at a book reading and have been a fan ever since. Molokai is the Hawaiian island where lepers were isolated below towering cliffs. The saga of the colony, Kalaupapa, is revealed by Rachel Kalama, a little Hawaiian girl diagnosed with leprosy in 1892. Wrenched from her home, she is quarantined on Kalaupapa. In spite of this tragic life Rachel survives and forms friendships among the memorable, ostracized characters. She grows up and even marries; in 1940 a cure is found.

Ohana, family, is a recurring theme as the residents make their own connections. As a frequent visitor to Hawaii, I’ve come to love not just the setting but respect the culture. I found this to be a beautifully written, engrossing story.

This story starts in Spain’s Civil War but immigrates to Chile. I have two reasons to be attracted to this book. First I grew up in South America and so am drawn to this setting, but second I had a writing mentor who was a small boy during the Franco regime. (I published his story in my blog.)

An exodus of thousands of Spaniards escaped into France and Cristian Zozaya was separated from his parents for years until they were able to immigrate to South America. His story echoes the beginning of Allende’s, except hers is about adult refugees in a marriage of convenience. The protagonists face trials in Chile with yet another dictatorship, but the ending is pleasing.

I love this tale narrated by a young academic who teams up with an exuberant, older working man named Zorba, “a passionate lover of wine, women and song” ...and dance. The younger man is more of a staid introvert. They are in a village in Crete to develop a mine. Their interactions are both amusing and philosophical. This contrasts with one horrific event where the appalled narrator struggles to understand the village’s moral codes which conflict with his own. In the final scene as he comes out of his shell, he asks Zorba to teach him to dance.

This is one of my favorite all-time novels. Kazantzakis words are to be savored.

After a blogger in Thailand interviewed me, he told me I should meet the author Rita Gardner, “Her memoir is about growing up in a Latin culture like yourself.” Rita and I exchanged books and personal stories, but her upbringing was darker than mine.

The young family moves to a remote village on a beach in the Dominican Republic in the 1950s. The two daughters are not only isolated, but their alcoholic father rants and makes irrational demands while the mother does nothing to protect them. During the light of day the dad proclaims them a “happy family, living in Paradise.” The writing is honest and captivating. You will root for Rita and be flabbergasted at what a young girl accomplishes on her own.