Author: Lisa Ko
# of Pages: 335 (paperback)
Genre: Adult, Contemporary
Rating: ★★☆☆☆
Synopsis: One morning, Deming Guo’s mother, an undocumented Chinese immigrant named Polly, goes to her job at the nail salon and never comes home. No one can find any trace of her. With his mother gone, eleven-year-old Deming is left with no one to care for him. He is eventually adopted by two white college professors who move him from the Bronx to a small town upstate. They rename him Daniel Wilkinson in their efforts to make him over into their version of an “all-American boy.” But far away from all he’s ever known, Daniel struggles to reconcile his new life with his mother’s disappearance and the memories of the family and community he left behind. Set in New York and China, The Leavers is a vivid and moving examination of borders and belonging. It’s the story of how one boy comes into his own when everything he’s loved has been taken away--and how a mother learns to live with the mistakes of her past.
Review: I just couldn't get into this book.
Deming's and his mother Polly's stories are actually pretty interesting. Polly's story reads as historical fiction and delves into the perspective of what it's like to grow up in rural China and become and undocumented Chinese immigrant. Deming's story is what it's like to be the son of said immigrant and struggle with feelings of identity and belonging in white suburban America.
However, the execution is weak; I couldn't help but wonder if this would have been a 3 or 4 star read at least if it was written by an author who was a stronger storyteller. The story is told in a hodgepodge of Deming's third person and Polly's first person perspectives that skip around between the past and present. It was hard to be invested in their stories with these constant changes, which were clearly used to beat around the bush of addressing why Polly suddenly disappeared.
Most of the story was really slow, literary but without impressive prose that I would expect from novels that are more "slice of life" than plot focused. This also meant I was not emotionally invested in either of their stories until closer to the ending. The last 100 pages were the best because it dug deeper into Polly's experiences as an undocumented immigrant, and the conclusion of Deiming's story is what digs into the core message of identity and belonging.
It seems intentional that Polly comes off as a narcissistic mother. While it's great to have nuanced, imperfect characters, I wish the author actually made her a bit more likable/redeemable because her chain of bad decisions made it hard to be sympathetic toward her most of the time. Her life experiences are compelling and feel mostly realistic, but I wish Polly was more introspective on the clash between her fierce independence and societal obligations to be a selfless mother. (This also drove home how important it is for people to learn about contraceptives, family planning/resources, financial planning, etc.)
The Chinese American experience of growing up in white suburbia is a story that just wasn't that interesting to me, probably a symptom of being a decent story that's read at the wrong time. I've also read/watched/heard about many similar stories (the first one that comes to mind is American Born Chinese), so this aspect of the story didn't feel very novel to me.
Overall not a bad book, but I wouldn't recommend it in a hurry. While it's thought provoking, there are other more more compelling storytellers that will cover some of the same topics.
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