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Title: Hotel at the Corner of Bitter and Sweet
Author: Jamie Ford
Genre: Book club bait contemporary/historical fiction (half now, half WWII)
Thingummies: 3.5
Synopsis: When widower Chinese American Henry sees workers unearthing objects abandoned by interned Japanese families during WWII, he is inspired to search for answers to the questions of his boyhood at the time, including the fate of his best friend, Keiko.
Thoughts: You can always tell a book aimed at the book club set by the discussion questions at the end.
This book slots nicely into the genre. In fact, if it wasn't for the fact that the protagonist is male, I'd say this would make a fantastic Lifetime movie, if it didn't sell the book rather short. It's heartwarming yet bittersweet, centering around a painful part of our past without actually raising difficult questions.
I did really like the perspective, which is unusual. Half of the book is from the viewpoint of a Chinese American boy growing up in Seattle during World War II. His closest friend at the beginning is a black saxophone player; he develops a crush on a Japanese American girl. It's interesting, and refreshing, to see some of the issues of racism played out through locations and ethnicities that don't immediately spring to mind. The Japanese internment is not an episode that I've seen in a lot of fiction. The book is well immersed in its time and location. It's fascinating to learn about a community I really knew nothing about.
I also appreciated the fact that the protagonist's viewpoint is colored by his own emotions, and he comes to realize this and how it complicates his relationship with his own adult son. I really liked Henry; he's falliable, but a good man trying his best to do the right thing.
The prose is a bit on the heavy-handed side, though. Nearly every chapter ends by taking what had been an okay bit of symbolism and explains it to the reader, underscoring deeply enough to leave imprints on the next three pages. Yes, we realize that searching through the pile of abandoned belongings represents searching through the past. Yes, we realize that the broken memorabilia symbolizes the fact that some things can't be fixed. We get it. We're not stupid. You don't have to then literally tell us that Henry sees the symbolic object and repeats the chapter's theme in his head.
So. Charming. Good use of history. Will leave you feeling bittersweetly happy. About as graceful as a hippo in toe shoes. (You see, the title means that his memories are both bitter and sweet. So you feel bittersweet. And the hotel the stuff is found in represents his memories. Should I explain this more?)
Author: Jamie Ford
Genre: Book club bait contemporary/historical fiction (half now, half WWII)
Thingummies: 3.5
Synopsis: When widower Chinese American Henry sees workers unearthing objects abandoned by interned Japanese families during WWII, he is inspired to search for answers to the questions of his boyhood at the time, including the fate of his best friend, Keiko.
Thoughts: You can always tell a book aimed at the book club set by the discussion questions at the end.
This book slots nicely into the genre. In fact, if it wasn't for the fact that the protagonist is male, I'd say this would make a fantastic Lifetime movie, if it didn't sell the book rather short. It's heartwarming yet bittersweet, centering around a painful part of our past without actually raising difficult questions.
I did really like the perspective, which is unusual. Half of the book is from the viewpoint of a Chinese American boy growing up in Seattle during World War II. His closest friend at the beginning is a black saxophone player; he develops a crush on a Japanese American girl. It's interesting, and refreshing, to see some of the issues of racism played out through locations and ethnicities that don't immediately spring to mind. The Japanese internment is not an episode that I've seen in a lot of fiction. The book is well immersed in its time and location. It's fascinating to learn about a community I really knew nothing about.
I also appreciated the fact that the protagonist's viewpoint is colored by his own emotions, and he comes to realize this and how it complicates his relationship with his own adult son. I really liked Henry; he's falliable, but a good man trying his best to do the right thing.
The prose is a bit on the heavy-handed side, though. Nearly every chapter ends by taking what had been an okay bit of symbolism and explains it to the reader, underscoring deeply enough to leave imprints on the next three pages. Yes, we realize that searching through the pile of abandoned belongings represents searching through the past. Yes, we realize that the broken memorabilia symbolizes the fact that some things can't be fixed. We get it. We're not stupid. You don't have to then literally tell us that Henry sees the symbolic object and repeats the chapter's theme in his head.
So. Charming. Good use of history. Will leave you feeling bittersweetly happy. About as graceful as a hippo in toe shoes. (You see, the title means that his memories are both bitter and sweet. So you feel bittersweet. And the hotel the stuff is found in represents his memories. Should I explain this more?)
