The Lacuna ~ book beginning (and teaser)

I'm back to this book, which I put aside for a couple of books due back at the library in seven days.  I'm enjoying this book, and this evening I realized I haven't thought to use it for either Book Beginnings on Friday or a Teaser post.  I'll rectify that oversight now.

"In the beginning were the howlers.  They always commenced their bellowing in the first hour of dawn, just as the hem of the sky began to whiten.  It would start with just one:  his forced, rhythmic groaning like a saw blade.  That aroused others near him, nudging them to bawl along with his monstrous tone.  Soon the maroon-throated howls would echo back from other trees, farther down the beach, until the hole jungle filled with roaring trees.  As it was in the beginning, so it is every morning of the world" (p. 1 of The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver, 2009).

This is beautiful writing, but it doesn't really entice me to continue.  In the next sentence, we learn a boy and his mother believe these howlers are devils screaming because they want to consume human flesh.  That still doesn't make me want to continue.  I must say the opening doesn't really appeal to me, but because I'm reading it with my online Book Buddies, I continued -- and it does become more interesting.  I have read 309 pages of this 509-page book.


Book Beginnings on Fridays is hosted by Katy F. at A Few More Pages.  Click this link to read other book beginnings.