A Tree Grows in Daicheng by Lu Nei: book review

A Tree Grows in Daicheng (2014, English translation 2017) is set in Daicheng, China, from the late 1960s to the early 1990s.

The narrator is the child of mother Li Suhua and father Gu Dahong, a clerk in the state-owned photography studio.

Gu Dahong’s friend, Fang the Butcher, was 20 years old in 1967, the year the Red Guards put up a barricade on Liberation Road on the east side of Rose Street. Along Rose Street, the shops hide the secrets of their owners’ lives.

Fang the Butcher liked Li Suhua’s younger sister, Li Hongxia, a Red Guard Commander, but the Butcher had joined the rebel faction, the Sharp Knife Camp, ‘which consisted entirely of pig slayers and meat sellers.’ Although it soon disbanded, Fang knew he was on the ‘wrong side’ of Li Hongxia’s government loyalty.

Torture changed Fang the Butcher forever.

The main focus of the story is on Gu Xiaoyan (Sister) and her younger brother Gu Xiaoshan (Boy), whose head tilts to the right, a ‘wonky head’ as a result of muscular torticollis. Boy finds friendship with another disabled boy, and love with Luo Jia. But she doesn’t love him.

The novel is rather disjointed and aimless, so it takes an effort to persevere to the end. It tells the story of a rural village, its residents, and the changing social and political landscape of China. Events such as the first television in the street in 1980, the typhoon, and the rise of new hotels and commercialism, are told in a lanquid way. But underneath all this is rejection, repression, the coming of age, and pain.

MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of:- Similar But Different in the Animal Kingdom (2017), The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

Comments

Pir-E-Kamil - The Perfect Mentor by Umera Ahmed: book review

The Perfect Mentor pbuh (2011) is set in Lahore and Islamabad in Pakistan. The novel commences with Imama Mubeen in medical university. She wants to be an eye specialist. Her parents have arranged for her to marry her first cousin Asjad. Salar Sikander, her neighbour, is 18 years old with an IQ of 150+ and a photographic memory. He has long hair tied in a ponytail. He imbibes alcohol, treats women disrespectfully and is generally a “weird chap” and a rude, belligerent teenager. In the past three years he has tried to commit suicide three times. He tries again. Imama and her brother, Waseem, answer the servant’s call to help Salar. They stop the bleeding from his wrist and save his life. Imama and Asjad have been engaged for three years, because she wants to finish her studies first. Imama is really delaying her marriage to Asjad because she loves Jalal Ansar. She proposes to him and he says yes. But he knows his parents won’t agree, nor will Imama’s parents. That

Flaws in the Glass, a self-portrait by Patrick White: book review

The manuscript, Flaws in the Glass (1981), is Patrick Victor Martindale White’s autobiography. White, born in 1912 in England, migrated to Sydney, Australia, when he was six months old. For three years, at the age of 20, he studied French and German literature at King’s College at the University of Cambridge in England. Throughout his life, he published 12 novels. In 1957 he won the inaugural Miles Franklin Literary Award for Voss, published in 1956. In 1961, Riders in the Chariot became a best-seller, winning the Miles Franklin Literary Award. In 1973, he was the first Australian author to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature for The Eye of the Storm, despite many critics describing his works as ‘un-Australian’ and himself as ‘Australia’s most unreadable novelist.’ In 1979, The Twyborn Affair was short-listed for the Booker Prize, but he withdrew it from the competition to give younger writers the opportunity to win the award. His autobiography, Flaws in the Glass

The Beggars' Strike by Aminata Sow Fall: book review

The Beggar’sStrike (1979 in French and 1981 in English) is set in an unstated country in West Africa in a city known only as The Capital. Undoubtedly, Senegalese author Sow Fall writes of her own experiences. It was also encapsulated in the 2000 film, Battu , directed by Cheick Oumar Sissoko from Mali. Mour Ndiaye is the Director of the Department of Public Health and Hygiene, with the opportunity of a distinguished and coveted promotion to Vice-President of the Republic. Tourism has declined and the government blames the local beggars in The Capital. Ndiaye must rid the streets of beggars, according to a decree from the Minister. Ndiaye instructs his department to carry out weekly raids. One of the raids leads to the death of lame beggar, Madiabel, who ran into an oncoming vehicle as he tried to escape, leaving two wives and eight children. Soon after, another raid resulted in the death of the old well-loved, comic beggar Papa Gorgui Diop. Enough is enou

FEAST OR FAMINE

Search This Blog