Barbara Kingsolver jokes that whenever she publishes a novel she apparently turns into a railway station because, according to reviewers, ``I only do departures.''
But while all of Kingsolver's books reflect a shimmering set of sensibilities, her latest novel stands a bit apart from her beloved debut The Bean Trees, its sequel Pigs in Heaven and other humorous and heartbreaking female-driven works about family and identity. The Lacuna (Harper, $26.99), which Kingsolver will discuss Monday at Miami Book Fair International, deals with those themes, too. But it delves even deeper into politics and national identity.
Set in the early-to-mid 20th century in Mexico and the United States, it's narrated by Harrison William Shepherd, a necessarily closeted gay writer who, as a youth, works in the households of Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo and ``Lev'' Trotsky.
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