8 or 9 of us met to discuss our reading experience.
This was a highly-debated book: some people loved it and some people liked it much less….
The book is a challenging read, in terms of its contents rather than its style.
The book is in the form of a letter written at the age of 28 by an aspiring American Vietnamese poet to his illiterate mother.
The letter relates the story of a young Vietnamese boy living in a town in New England, USA, raised by his Vietnamese single mother and grandmother. The mum earns a living working in a nail salon, working long hours, coming home exhausted. Both ladies have suffered trauma during the war in Vietnam, and hardly speak any English. “Little Dog” (that’s what they call the little boy) is greatly cherished but at the same time treated with great harshness, even sometimes beaten up. It’s a hard environment, but still intimate amongst the two ladies, but poverty and racism are omnipresent.
Soon, “Little Dog” reaches the age of 14 and can work. He discovers a new world, working for a tobacco company, working in the tobacco fields and learning how to pick and deal with the tobacco leaves. This is where he meets Trevor who is the manager’ son and a love affair unfolds. It is a sexual awakening fueled with dope- smoking and young love discoveries. Trevor is also a substance addict and succumbs to a heroin overdose. The loss is immense for “Little Dog” and this was in the book, the writing becomes very poetic, close to a lament, the sheer pain of the loss vividly expressed in some stunning prose.
This is a semi-autobiographical novel.
The book got mixed reviews from the members of our group: some loved it, some found it a difficult but interesting read and some could not finish it.
One thing is for sure, it did not leave people feeling indifferent, moved by the difficult topics related to this story: the trauma of the war in Vietnam, the difficulty in integrating a new society, class, labour, poverty, abuse, sexuality and mental illness.
The book should carry a word of warning though, as some scenes make a very difficult and very shocking read. Crude language is used as well, making some scenes quite disturbing.
“ I loved it! “ said one person at the very start of our debate. This person had not read the book but had listened to it on audible; what made the listening really special was that it was actually read by the author, making the experience very personal. Could it be that the story had a different impact as it was read by the author himself as opposed to simply reading the pages of a paperback?
Other views were that it was a bleak story but extremely well-written, with the use of beautiful poetic language. But, one criticism was that maybe the writing was too polished. And the lack of chronology was found irritating with some different stories jumping forward and backwards in time.
The tobacco industry in the USA was well-described and was interesting to discover.
The images evoked in some scenes were very vivid and tender, particularly the scene where the grandma makes “Little Dog” steal some flowers so she can have colour in her life or when “Little Dog” lies down next to his mother.
The overall consensus of our discussions was that the story in this book was a bleak one, not an uplifting story but a very moving one with the use of the most beautiful and clever language.
No comments:
Post a Comment