The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver (Faber & Faber, £7.99 in UK)

An American Baptist preacher brings his wife and four daughters to a remote missionary outpost in the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry everything they believe they will need - "We came from Bethlehem, Georgia, bearing Betty Crocker cake mixes into the jungle", is the opening sentence - only to find that all of it, from garden seeds to godliness, is disastrously affected by Africa. The narrative is a tapestry of short chapters in which each of the five women speaks in turn; the voices are strong and distinct, from the mother's impressionistic backward glances to Leah's wry observation to Ruth May's childish innocence, and the result is a beautiful, angry work of post-colonial literature which does not release its grip on the reader until the last page - and beyond.