Book Blog #353: Lady Tan's Circle of Women by Lisa See

 

Title: Lady Tan's Circle of Women

Author: Lisa See

# of Pages: 342 (hardback)

Genre: Adult, Historical Fiction

Rating: ★★★★☆

Synopsis: According to Confucius, “an educated woman is a worthless woman,” but Tan Yunxian—born into an elite family, yet haunted by death, separations, and loneliness—is being raised by her grandparents to be of use. Her grandmother is one of only a handful of female doctors in China, and she teaches Yunxian the pillars of Chinese medicine, the Four Examinations—looking, listening, touching, and asking—something a man can never do with a female patient. From a young age, Yunxian learns about women’s illnesses, many of which relate to childbearing, alongside a young midwife-in-training, Meiling. The two girls find fast friendship and a mutual purpose—despite the prohibition that a doctor should never touch blood while a midwife comes in frequent contact with it—and they vow to be forever friends, sharing in each other’s joys and struggles. No mud, no lotus , they tell from adversity beauty can bloom. But when Yunxian is sent into an arranged marriage, her mother-in-law forbids her from seeing Meiling and from helping the women and girls in the household. Yunxian is to act like a proper wife—embroider bound-foot slippers, recite poetry, give birth to sons, and stay forever within the walls of the family compound, the Garden of Fragrant Delights.

Review: I only knew two things going into the book: the cultural focus would be at least Chinese-adjacent (as per the title), and there would be graphic descriptions about the foot binding process.

Both ended up being more than true. The foot binding process was only a small fraction of the story and is actually just the tip of the iceberg of the depth of See's research in traditional Chinese customs. See's detailed account of Chinese medicine actually is what made the first ~100 pages difficult for me to get through. I don't have a particular interest in reading about medicine, so I was worried I picked the wrong book for me. It would be at most a 3 star read if it continued to lean toward being a slow history lesson rather than an engaging life story. 

However, after that first 100 pages, it got a lot better. I became invested in Lady Tan's life story albeit fictional (while Lady Tan is a real historical figure, little is known about her, so the author had to fictionalize many details to connect the dots). On theme with the women's fiction streak that I'm starting, this book focuses more on Lady Tan's non-romantic relationships, especially those with other woman. 

There's a question that arose from me that actually ended up being answered by the author on her website: "There are certain aspects of the novel that seem very contemporary—the epidemic outbreak, the arguments for and against variolation, and questions over who has control over women’s bodies. Was that intentional?" While the author says she is being historically accurate to the sentiments for/against variolation at the time, there are undoubtably parallels with the debate over the COVID-19 vaccines that were happening at the time of publication in 2021. This admittedly broke the immersion into traditional Chinese culture for me since there was extra focus on this topic in particular over other medical topics.

Something that surprised me is that the book also became somewhat of a murder mystery? Not enough so that it would reclassify the genre of the book, but enough to be startling for a book I expected to be vanilla historical fiction. 

Overall, this book was better than I thought! Despite the slow start, See did a decent job at avoiding making her book read like a textbook and created characters that the reader actually will care about. I would recommend this book to people who are interested about Chinese history and women empowerment. 

Book Blog #352: The Push by Ashley Audrain

 

Title: The Push

Author: Ashley Audrain

# of Pages: 307 (hardback)

Genre: Adult, Mystery, Thriller, Contemporary

Rating: ★★★★☆

Synopsis: Blythe Connor is determined that she will be the warm, comforting mother to her new baby Violet that she herself never had. But in the thick of motherhood’s exhausting early days, Blythe becomes convinced that something is wrong with her daughter–she doesn’t behave like most children do. Or is it all in Blythe’s head? Her husband, Fox, says she’s imagining things. The more Fox dismisses her fears, the more Blythe begins to question her own sanity, and the more we begin to question what Blythe is telling us about her life as well. Then their son Sam is born–and with him, Blythe has the blissful connection she’d always imagined with her child. Even Violet seems to love her little brother. But when life as they know it is changed in an instant, the devastating fall-out forces Blythe to face the truth.

Review: I knew very little going into this book other than vaguely knowing it was somehow related to motherhood. 

The narration is in first person and starts from the end before bouncing between multiple generations of history to peel the onion on Blythe's family's story. It took me a while to figure out what was going on (I didn't even know whether the protagonist was a woman or not, whether the main source of conflict would be with her past or her present or something else entirely).

After the first ~80 pages though, I became hooked and started to the feel the mystery/thriller aspects more strongly. It's more of a thriller in a realistic sense rather than in a way that is amped up to try to scare the reader. The protagonist will notice something is not quite what she expected with her daughter, and the reader feels the same worry, fear, and repulsion that Blythe feels. 

The Push was not without its failings though - the narration is very disjoint jumping between the grandmother's generation, Blythe's childhood, and even between parts of the present. The sloppy narration may have been on purpose to make the reader question Blythe's narration, but it broke my flow while reading and "spoiled" outcomes later in the book as a cheap and frustrating way to make the reader want to know how something happened.

Also, although it's a smaller part of the book, this is another example where the protagonist wants to do something related to writing as her profession. This always screams unoriginality and hints at the author's inability to create characters that are different from the industry they are familiar with. 

Audrain did a great job making motherhood seem really horrible. It draws on a real nightmare scenario that all parents fear that they'll create a monster via their children. I could see this being a great required reading for aspiring mothers to test how strongly the actually want to have kids. 

Otherwise, I sped through this book (a few days where most of the book was read in 1), and my mind kept wanting to know more details about Blythe and her family. I was wavering between 3 and 4 stars, but leaned toward 4 stars just because of how easy it was to read. However, I'm not in a hurry to recommend it - the story is interesting but the execution could have been cleaner. I'd be excited to see Audrain's future works since she came up with a great concept for a debut novel. 

Book Blog #351: Sing Her Down by Ivy Pochoda

 

Title: Sing Her Down

Author: Ivy Pochoda

# of Pages: 272 (paperback)

Genre: Adult, Historical Fiction, Mystery

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Synopsis: Florence “Florida” Baum is not the hapless innocent she claims to be when she arrives at the Arizona women’s prison―or so her ex-cellmate Diosmary Sandoval keeps insinuating. Dios knows the truth about Florida’s crimes, understands what Florence hides even from that she was never a victim of circumstance, an unlucky bystander misled by a bad man. Dios knows that darkness lives in women too, despite the world’s refusal to see it. And she is determined to open Florida’s eyes and unleash her true self. When an unexpected reprieve gives both women their freedom, Dios’s fixation on Florida turns into a dangerous obsession, and a deadly cat-and-mouse chase ensues from Arizona to the desolate streets of Los Angeles.

Review: Is the "thrilling Western" in the room with us? Because whatever I read was a historical fiction with unnecessarily flowery prose. 

The good: this captures a sliver of what life was like during COVID pandemic (which wildly is several years in the past already). 

The bad: everything else. 

It's a given I wasn't going to like the POV switching, but this one is particularly poorly executed. It's not just POV switching but ALSO first and third person narration switching AND time skipping. The switching made the narration VERY disjointed (a risk for this style that REAL stood out as a failing for this book). 

Even after finishing this book, I'm struggling to figure out why this book was even written. It's clear that there is some feminist messaging going on, but I'm failing to see a positive message here. The book seems to be pushing the idea that "all women are capable of being violent," but this message isn't particularly enlightening/surprising. 

Overall, it was just really hard to get into this book with all the different characters' ramblings. It's not a gripping mystery because I didn't care enough about these characters to care about what these criminals are doing with their lives. There's a bunch of action/crime that happens in gruesome detail, but even that failed to engage me as a reader, and I couldn't help but keep putting this book down.

I really don't get the point of reading this book and wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

Book Blog #350: Circe by Madeline Miller

 

Title: Circe

Author: Madeline Miller

# of Pages: 407 (ebook)

Genre: Adult, Fantasy

Rating: ★★★☆☆

Synopsis: In the house of Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans, a daughter is born. But Circe has neither the look nor the voice of divinity, and is scorned and rejected by her kin. Increasingly isolated, she turns to mortals for companionship, leading her to discover a power forbidden to the gods: witchcraft. When love drives Circe to cast a dark spell, wrathful Zeus banishes her to the remote island of Aiaia. There she learns to harness her occult craft, drawing strength from nature. But she will not always be alone; many are destined to pass through Circe's place of exile, entwining their fates with hers. The messenger god, Hermes. The craftsman, Daedalus. A ship bearing a golden fleece. And wily Odysseus, on his epic voyage home. There is danger for a solitary woman in this world, and Circe's independence draws the wrath of men and gods alike. To protect what she holds dear, Circe must decide whether she belongs with the deities she is born from, or the mortals she has come to love.

Review: I'm going to have high expectations for any book that has high ratings (4+ star average) and has won a Goodreads Choice award. However, I'm really struggling to understand the hype.

I can appreciate how Miller took a lesser known goddess from Greek mythology (Circe) and built out her story to highlight the roles she played in many famous Greek myths (think Odysseus and the Underworld, the Minotaur, the Golden Fleece). It's giving the same empowering-hidden-women-in-history vibes that I got from Hamilton (and is a common theme in many modern historical re-tellings). This concept, while not entirely original, was one of first popular Greek mythology re-telling I've seen since Percy Jackson.

However, this book is just okay. I had no idea who Circe when I started this book, and I had no idea where her story was going. Since she is immortal, there's some detachment from her narrative that isn't relatable to the reader. Her "life story" quite literally spans centuries, so there's no urgency since she has all the time in the world and more. The beginning half of the story really dragged because of the slice of life nature of it and is what caused me to take so long (almost 2 months) to get myself to finish reading it. 

Things pick up in the latter half, partially because there are more references to the recognizable Greek myths. It was a lot more fun to read when comparing how the original Greek myth compared to Miller's telling of it compared to the sludge that was Circe's character building (or lack thereof). 

You MUST read this book knowing that everything Miller is writing is in the framework of already written mythology. If Greek myths were written today, they'd get a lot of flack on their realism, character building, etc. A lot of the parts I didn't enjoy (e.g. a character's decision making is unrealistic/far fetched, events occur that are too convenient) are unfortunately part of the OG myths and have to be carried into this story as well. 

I can see how people who are really into Greek mythology might enjoy this book. I'm unfortunately not that type of person, and there wasn't enough original content to get a clear idea on whether Miller was particularly good at crafting a story. 

From what I've learned about Circe in this book, there's good reason why she is not famous - her story is not particularly interesting, and that's okay (and even part of the messaging of this book). But I think because of this, I don't think the book was particularly worth reading, and I question whether Circe was the story Miller should be retelling. 

I would recommend this only if you are already interested in Greek mythology/re-tellings.

Book Blog #349: Viewfinder by Jon M. Chu, Jeremy McCarter

 

Title: Viewfinder

Author: Jon M. Chu, Jeremy McCarter

# of Pages: 289 (hardback)

Genre: Non-fiction,  Autobiography

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Synopsis: Long before he directed Wicked, In The Heights, or the groundbreaking film Crazy Rich Asians, Jon M. Chu was a movie-obsessed first-generation Chinese American, helping at his parents’ Chinese restaurant in Silicon Valley and forever facing the cultural identity crisis endemic to children of immigrants. Growing up on the cutting edge of twenty-first-century technology gave Chu the tools he needed to make his mark at USC film school, and to be discovered by Steven Spielberg, but he soon found himself struggling to understand who he was. In this book, for the first time, Chu turns the lens on his own life and work, telling the universal story of questioning what it means when your dreams collide with your circumstances, and showing how it’s possible to succeed even when the world changes beyond all recognition. With striking candor and unrivaled insights, Chu offers a firsthand account of the collision of Silicon Valley and Hollywood—what it’s been like to watch his old world shatter and reshape his new one. Ultimately, Viewfinder is about reckoning with your own story, becoming your most creative self, and finding a path all your own.

Review: Jon M. Chu is a great filmmaker. I've some of he's biggest hits such as Crazy Rich Asians and Wicked. He's also not half-bad at speaking - I happened to see a clip from an interview (podcast?) where he talks about some behind-the-scene tidbits such as how his mom's words and Steven Spielberg impacted his career. 

In fact, those tidbits were actually the most interesting talking points of this book, his memoir. Already, Chu had these "spoilers" working against him, but it's not a dealbreaker for me. A similar situation happened with Jennette McCurdy's book, but it didn't stop me from being captivated. 

However, Chu should stick with his most familiar medium - film. I didn't need to read in the last 100 pages about his parent's lives describe to me as if it were a movie. While his parent's success story could actual stand alone as its own story, the way this section was written actually put me in a readers block, and this book ended up sitting untouched on a table for weeks. 

The rest of the story was not bad per se. Many readers likely don't know just how many movies Chu has worked on, so this was a pleasant surprise in the earlier parts of the book before getting his Crazy Rich Asians era. However, I couldn't help but feel like this book was premature - Chu is relatively young and likely has many more movies ahead of him. I couldn't help but think that maybe this should have stayed in the drafts until latter in his life.

Overall, I didn't find this book to be worth reading. It's great that Chu found a role model in Steve Jobs, but the first part of this book felt like a Steve Jobs fan boy's memoir. If you're interested in Chu's story, just watch his interviews. 

Book Blog #348: James by Percival Everett

 

Title: James

Author: Percival Everett

# of Pages: 302 (hardback)

Genre: YA, Historical Fiction

Rating: ★★★★☆

Synopsis: When Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he runs away until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck has faked his own death to escape his violent father. As all readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous and transcendent journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward the elusive and unreliable promise of the Free States and beyond.

Review: This is the Huckleberry Finn story told from Jim's perspective that no one asked for but was better than it conceptually sounds. 

A borderline 3 star read for me - whenever people do a alternative perspective of a story, I'm always a bit skeptical of authors taking advantage of a pre-existing plot due to their own failings as a story teller. Another book I read recently, Wicked, does an okay job at this due to the amount of original content, but it had other questionable choices with how the story was structured, thus the three star rating.

At least the first half of James isn't as original as I hoped (a lot of overlap with the Huck Finn story). I was bored with basically rereading a story with some minor extra details thrown in, and would have given the book 3 stars if it stayed that way. However, the latter half goes deeper into new content and the perspective of a slave but ended abruptly right when I was getting into the story. 

Overall, an engaging read nonetheless. The writing is straight forward and easy to follow (making this a YA-level read despite some rape descriptions), but it was entertaining even without having prior interest in reading Jim's perspective. I would recommend it if the concept of a classic story retelling of Huck Finn sounds interesting to you.

Book Blog #347: Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa

 

Title: Days at the Morisaki Bookshop

Author: Satoshi Yagisawa

# of Pages: 147 (paperback)

Genre: YA, Contemporary, Romance

Rating:★★☆☆☆

Synopsis: Hidden in Jimbocho, Tokyo, is a booklover's paradise. On a quiet corner in an old wooden building lies a shop filled with hundreds of second-hand books. Twenty-five-year-old Takako has never liked reading, although the Morisaki bookshop has been in her family for three generations. It is the pride and joy of her uncle Satoru, who has devoted his life to the bookshop since his wife Momoko left him five years earlier. When Takako's boyfriend reveals he's marrying someone else, she reluctantly accepts her eccentric uncle's offer to live rent-free in the tiny room above the shop. Hoping to nurse her broken heart in peace, Takako is surprised to encounter new worlds within the stacks of books lining the Morisaki bookshop. As summer fades to autumn, Satoru and Takako discover they have more in common than they first thought. The Morisaki bookshop has something to teach them both about life, love, and the healing power of books.

Review: Maybe this is a book best appreciated in the original language (Japanese). 

It's not clear who the intended audience is, but after reading I think it would actually appeal best to a younger audience. Takako, the main character, is young woman who doesn't read but eventually falls in love with reading after moving into the Morisaki bookshop. Because of this, she serves as a great protagonist for new young readers to relate to. 

The vibe from this book is very chill and cozy, but the writing is simple and the plotline is not particularly interesting. Part of the issue might be that the story is so short - there's very little time to develop the characters organically, so I wasn't very attached. There was also very little time for the characters to develop believable relationships with each other and lost focus as the book progressed as the story jumps between Takako's love life and her missing aunt. 

Hardly a romance, not even a mystery as it was describe to me, not much of anything at all. It's a very fast and short read, but I wouldn't say it is worth the time.