~The Night Tiger Yangsze Choo In 1930’s Malaysia, smart and ambitious Ji Lin works as a dressmaker’s apprentice but dreams of becoming a nurse. At night she moonlights as a dance hall girl in order to pay off her mother’s mahjong debts. One evening, while dancing with a rather unsavory character, she accidentally comes into possession of a severed finger in a jar. Meanwhile, eleven year old Chinese houseboy, Ren is tasked by Dr. McFarlane, who is on his deathbed, with finding his masters severed finger so it can be buried with him, thus preventing his soul from eternally wandering the earth. According to folklore, Ren has 49 days to complete his mission. When Dr. McFarlane gifts Ren to his old friend Dr. Acton, the man who amputated the finger years before, Ren hopes to be able to easily find the finger in his new home. And thus our two protagonists begin a slow dance towards each other, although not before we learn about the pasts of the two doctors, of Ren’s twin brother Yi and of Ji Lin’s own past with her step-father and step-brother, Shin. Scattered along the way are several mysterious deaths and much talk of weretigers…like werewolves only the tiger takes on a human form, not the other way around. It’s a mystical magical confection of a novel with a curious mix of British colonialism and Chinese folklore, tradition and superstition. It’s beautifully written, weaving together a story of loss, love and loyalty and layered with history, culture, the supernatural and magical realism. As with any book containing magical realism, it has the luxury of being able to stretch the boundaries of belief without seeming contrived and along with its exotic setting and wonderfully rendered characters this is an exquisite joy to read.
~The Sugar Queen Sarah Addison Allen Twenty seven year old Josey lives in a North Carolina ski town with her mother, a woman who doesn’t fail to belittle her at every turn. Josey, shy, reclusive and a bit on the pudgy side, finds solace in a hidden closet stuffed with candy and romance novels. Then one day something strange happens…Della Lee Baker, a waitress at the local greasy spoon, takes up residence in it and wont leave. Della then makes it her mission to prod Josey out of her lonely existence in an attempt to build herself her life which doesn’t revolve around her mother. As a result, Josey finally makes a friend in Chloe, who owns the local sandwich shop and has problems of her own, not the least of which are the books which are always showing up, with titles which mysteriously correlate to her immediate problem. It’a a fairy tale-ish story of love, friendship and the enchantment of possibilities set in a quaint town with quirky people. It’s a little predictable with a few surprises hidden up its sleeve and the writing is strong enough to make it sweet without being syrupy. With its sprinkling of magical realism it makes for a pleasant and relaxing read if you’re in need of something to escape into.
~Tin Man Sarah Winman Dora Judd wins a raffle and as her prize, bypasses the bottle of whisky her husband yells at her to choose, instead going for a hand painted reproduction of Van Gogh’s Sunflowers because she had seen the original on a school trip “and she knew immediately that this was the life she wanted: Freedom. Possibility, Beauty“. Those three words are like a mantra coursing through this exquisitely written short novel with its complicated themes of love, grief, art and loneliness. It is a minor miracle that Ms Winman has managed to pack so much into such a short book. At its heart it is the story of two boys, Ellis and Michael, who meet at 10, become fast friends and then experience a relationship which turns into something more. Years later Ellis marries Annie and the three form a close bond, until Michael completely stops coming to visit them in Oxford from his home in London. It is a story in two halves, first narrated by Ellis as he looks back on his life and struggles to cope in the present with the loss of his wife, and the second narrated by Michael set against a backdrop of the AIDS epidemic telling a story which fills in a lot of the gaps left by Ellis. Part of the story takes place in the South of France and Tin Man brilliantly conjures up the intoxicating essence of the South so that you feel you have been transported there. It is there that one of her characters says something that really struck me: “And I remember thinking, how cruel it was that our plans were out there somewhere. Another version of our future in perpetual orbit.” There are no cliches in this book, just hauntingly beautiful words which burn as bright as sunflowers and spill out onto the page with subtlety and nuance. It’s a story at once simple yet complex, deeply authentic and filled with quiet regret and wistful melancholy.
~A Woman is No Man Etaf Rum Beginning in Palestine in 1990, we learn about Isra who must endure an arranged marriage which takes her to Brooklyn, NY. Here she struggles to adapt to her new life, her husband Adam, her oppressive Mother-in-Law, Fareeda, which only gets worse as she quickly gives birth to four children, none of them boys, which is the lynchpin around which this book revolves. The story is told via two timelines: that of Isra and also of her daughter Deya, eighteen years later. It is the story of a family, then and now, with an intriguing mystery at its core, brought about when Deya receives a note to meet someone who has information about her parents. From here the back and forth between the two story lines nicely parses out information until a bigger picture is illuminated. It is an engaging story, nicely written, which also gives plenty of background on the history of Israel and Palestine, written more from the Palestine angle, which doesn’t happen too often and which I thoroughly enjoyed. It’s also a raw and open look into a world where women are treated as second class citizens with few rights of their own. It is heavy on the cultural aspects of Palestine which in this instance creates a world of lies and shame which gets passed from one generation to the next. To a great extent, Ms.Rum is rather blowing the lid off her own culture and in that regard, this story is clearly crafted with a great deal of care and thoughtfulness. There are however, some downsides. I always enjoy reading about different cultures and this was no exception. It’s certainly not an easy read, focusing as it does on the physical and emotional abuse of women and it is a story which deserves to be heard. The problem for me was that I felt a little like I was being beaten over the head about what women in the Muslim world endure with its history of violence from men. Things felt repetitive and overstuffed at times and bogged down under the weight of itself and it lacked a certain gravitas that should have accompanied a book dealing with this subject matter. Having said that, this was, nonetheless, a compelling well-written read which I think works better for its subject matter of a different culture. If this had been written about an American couple it would not have worked at all.
~The Silent Patient Alex Michaelides I read about 70 pages of this, decided I wasn’t crazy about it and wondered why I was being pulled in to reading yet another psychological thriller when I keep saying “no more”. So it was set aside to return to the library unread. And then I stumbled upon yet more great reviews and found myself, damn it, picking it up again. Psychological thrillers are generally fast to read and faced with a cold and rainy Saturday morning, figured I could just curl up and read it pretty much in one sitting. Which is what I did. Was it worth it? Well, when I originally set it aside I announced to myself who the murderer was and I was kind of, though not really, right. The problem being, of course, is that if you read a lot of books like this, you become attuned to the way things work and what the outcome might be. The plot goes something like this: Alicia Berenson, a painter, has a nice life living in a London home in a nice area of town with husband Gabriel, a fashion photographer. One night she shoots him in the face five times and then never speaks again. A few years later, criminal psychotherapist Theo Faber comes along and decides he wants to unravel this little mystery. And unravel it he does, with all the obligatory twists, turns and red herrings. As far as psychological thriller go, this ain’t half bad. The writing is good, there are no surface level, gaping holes in the plot (although admittedly I no longer take the time to deeply analyze such things) and it’s nicely paced. It’s certainly intriguing enough to keep you going, but ultimately it’s a little like downing a pint of ice cream or devouring one too many Cadbury’s Creme Eggs (what, just me?): it seems like a good idea at the time but, after the fact, you’re left with the beginnings of a headache and a sense of regret. So ultimately I would say this: if a good psychological thriller is your jam, you could do far worse and the reviews for this one are overwhelmingly favourable . If, however, you cannot for the life of you figure out why you keep getting pulled into this genre, a literary siren song, do yourself a favour and strike it off your TBR.
~The Paragon Hotel Lyndsay Faye In 1921 Alice James, also known as Nobody, a nickname her mother gave to her, hops a train in New York with 50,000 dollars of illicit money and a bullet wound. She arrives in Portland, OR where she is helped and befriended by Max, a black porter on the train who takes her to the Paragon Hotel. The Paragon, it turns out, is an all black hotel which does not take kindly to a white lady in its midsts, especially one who seems to come with a shady past. Now, while Portland today has quite the reputation for being a bastion of liberal thinking, some may not be familiar with its deep and ugly roots in racism. When entering the Union in 1859, Oregon became the only state to explicitly forbid black people from living there. Even today it remains just about the whitest state in the country. Read this for a bit more info. Anyway, back to the book. It’s written in dual narratives, one in 1930’s Portland, the second Alice’s childhood backstory in the Italian community in New York, where she grows up dealing with the mafia and which ultimately leads to the reason she ended up in Portland. The present day storyline is about the people who save and take care of Alice at the hotel: Dr. Pendleton, singer Blossom Fontaine, white philanthropist Evelina, and six year old Davy Lee, the orphaned hotel mascot who one day mysteriously vanishes. This incident sets off a manhunt which plays out against the backdrop of the KKK and burning crosses. Alice, meanwhile, is determined to unravel the mystery of what has happened to Davy Lee and once she goes poking around, finds herself caught up in a web of lies and deceit…some of it her own. I thoroughly enjoyed this story which takes love and redemption as its overarching theme. It’s clear Ms. Faye did her research before writing because you do feel fully immersed in the era. It’s written in the jaunty style of the period with lots of witty repartee, which I personally loved but some might find a little overwrought and fatiguing if you’re not crazy about that sort of thing. Overall, an intriguing tale with a couple of surprises.
