The Bean Trees

A novel by Barbara Kingsolver about a small town girl named Taylor Greer who decides to drive her car as far as it'll take her and settle down wherever it ends up breaking. Along the way she travels with a Guatemalan couple and after traveling through an Indian reserve, she gets saddled with the toddler Turtle. The rest of the novel deals with the relationships between her and the people in her new town as well as the details of this unexpected motherhood.


 * Abusive Parents
 * The Alleged Car: Taylor drives an old junker, and her plan is to drive it until it breaks down.
 * Incest Is Relative: Turtle was given to Taylor by a well-meaning relative because two-year-old Turtle's uncle was beating her... and from the looks of the bruises, probably raping her as well.
 * Mandatory Motherhood
 * Promotion to Parent
 * Sexy Priest: Father William
 * Small Town Boredom: The driving force of this novel.
 * Surprisingly Good English: Estevan to Taylor, justified given that he's an English teacher.
 * Teen Pregnancy: The fate of most of the girls in Taylor's hometown. Taylor escapes this, only to get another person's toddler dumped onto her lap as soon as she leaves her hometown.
 * The Rez
 * This Is My Name on Foreign: Estevan and Esperanza introducing themselves as "Steven" and "Hope" to potentially avoid prejudice.
 * Unresolved Sexual Tension: Between Estevan and Taylor.
 * Wrench Wench: Mattie.