A Tiger In The Kitchen: A Memoir Of Food And Family by Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan

About the author:  Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan is a New York-based writer who has covered fashion, retail, and home design (and written the occasional food story) for the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and InStyle magazine, among many other publications.  More can be learned on the author's website or you can like/follow her on Facebook and Twitter.  Don't forget to favourite her delectable blog on her travels and eating adventures.


Backcover blurb:  After growing up in Singapore, the most food-obsessed city in the world, Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan left home and family at eighteen for America - proof of the rebelliousness of daughters born in the Year of the Tiger.  But as a thirtysomething fashion writer in New York, she felt the dishes that defined her childhood calling her back.  Was it too late to learn the secrets of her grandmothers' and aunties' kitchens?  In her quest to recreate the dishes of Singapore by cooking with her female relatives , Tan learned not only cherished recipes but long-buried family stories.

A Tiger in the Kitchen, which includes ten recipes for Singaporean classics such as pineapple tarts and Teochew braised duck, is the charming story of a Chinese-Singaporean ex-pat who learns to infuse her New York lifestyle with rich kitchen lessons that reconnect her with her family and herself.

The latest video of the author talking about A Tiger in the Kitchen (published 8 February 2011) on Channel News Asia:



My thoughts:  A much-needed book to read for those who live far from home and miss their childhood food and family; for those who are not, you will find yourself educated in Singapore cuisine and culture but much more than that, it makes you appreciate loved ones who slaved away in the kitchen to put those lovingly prepared dishes on the table no matter where and who you are because food as we know it connects us with our roots and "is the tie that binds."  A true gem of a book with life's lessons thrown in.  Do not miss it.

Rating:  4/5 

The Third Secret by Steve Berry

An excerpt from the Prologue:  Fatima, Portugal.  July 13, 1917.  Lucia stared toward heaven and watched the Lady descend.  The apparition came from the east, as it had twice before, emerging as a sparkling dot from deep within the cloudy sky.  Her glide never wavered as She quickly approached.  Her form brightening as it settled above the holm oak, eight feet off the ground.

The Lady stood upright.  Her crystallized imaged clothed in a glow that seemed more brilliant than the sun.  Lucia lowered her eyes in response to the dazzling beauty.

...The form was transparent, in varied hues of yellow, white, and blue.  The face was beautiful, but strangely shaded in sorrow.  A dress fell to Her ankles.  A veil covered Her head.  A rosary resembling pearls intertwined folded hands.  The voice was gentle and pleasant, never rising or lowering, a soothing constant, like the breeze that continued to sweep over the crowd.

...The Lady opened Her clasped hands and spread Her arms.  A penetrating radiance poured forth and bathed Lucia in a warmth much like that of a winter sun on a cool day.  She embraced the feeling, then saw that the radiance did not stop at her and her two cousins.  Instead, it passed through the earth and the ground opened.

This was new and different, and it frightened her.


Backcover blurb:  What is the Third Secret?  It is rumoured to be a prediction so shocking that it has been locked away for over 80 years.  But when it is finally revealed in 2000, it seems puzzling, less than sensational.  Is something being held back?  Could this be what is drawing Pope Clement XV to the Vatican archive, night after sleepless night?

When Father Colin Michener is sent on a secret mission to the highlands of Romania, he is pitched into a vortex of suspicion, deceit, murder and forbidden passion.  Suddenly, he is forced to face the very thing that has so distressed the Pope - and to unravel a mystery that will shake the world.

My thoughts:  As Berry wrote in his note, "The Catholic Church is unique among man's institutions.  It has not only survived for more than two millennia, but continues to grow and prosper.  Yet many wonder what will be its fate in the coming century.  Some want to fundamentally change the Church.  Others want a return to its traditional roots.  But perhaps Pope Leo XIII, in 1881, said it best - The Church needs nothing but the truth."  

There is without argument an imperceptible line between the truth and a lie.  The question that keeps arising is should we know the truth so that we can lie or is the latter used to cover up the former?  To have faith means to accept what the Lord has done without question and to have total devotion to the Lord.  Be happy in the knowledge that God is alive!  Why must we always question the meaning of things?

The Third Secret, a stand-alone book, is part fiction and part fact, but even more so...this one contains a wealth of reality.  I have thoroughly enjoyed reading this book and have come to rely on Berry's books for the two Es, "education and entertainment."  I think it would be prudent to know how to sieve fact from fiction and not to take certain information too seriously when you read this book.  Instead, have faith, sit back, put your feet up and enjoy this bestseller from a highly knowledgeable author.

More fascinating information, thought-provoking questions, images and others can be found on Steve Berry's official website.

Rating:  5/5

Winter And Night (A Lydia Chin/Bill Smith Novel) by S J Rozan

Backcover blurb:  Private detective Bill Smith is hurtled headlong into the most provocative - and personal - case of his career when he receives a chilling late night telephone call from the NYPD, who is holding his fifteen-year-old nephew Gary.  But before he can find out what's going on, Gary escapes Bill's custody and disappears into the dark and unfamiliar streets...

Bill and his partner, Lydia Chin, try to find the missing teen and uncover what has led him so far from home.  Their search takes them to Gary's family in a small town in New Jersey, where they discover that one of Gary's classmates was murdered.  Bill and Lydia delve into the crime - only to find it eerily similar to a decades-old murder-suicide...

Now, with his nephew's future - and perhaps his very life - at stake, Bill must unravel a long-buried crime and confront the darkness of his own past...

My favourite passage from the book displaying Rozan's talent in describing a situation.  Simple yet powerful.  I love it to bits:

In a front yard, a guy was raking leaves.  A gust of wind charged into his leaf pile, tossed the leaves around his lawn.  It shook the branches of the oak tree above him, raining down more leaves, and blew the maple leaves from his neighbour's yard over to him.  The man straightened up, stood holding his rake, staring around him, as the leaves swirled.

My brief thoughts:  Robert Crais wrote that "...Winter and Night...is also a full-bodied novel about the pressures we place on ourselves and our loved ones, and how these pressures can crush us."  Most often and unfairly, bad people get away with what they did and it is only too true that the problem with justice is that there is no such thing.

An excerpt from Chapter One is taken from the author's website and can be read here.

This is another top recommendation by me in as much as it is a rewarding read by one of the finest crime writers of today.  She never disappoints.  That is all I want to say.

In 2003, Winter and Night (published in 2002 and eighth in the series), won the Shamus Award (Best P I Novel), the Barry Award (Best Novel), the Edgar Award (Best Novel), the Nero Award (Excellence in Mystery Genre), the Macavity Award (Best Mystery Novel), and was nominated for the Anthony Award (Best Novel).  In 2009, it picked up the Maltese Falcon Award for "Best Hardboiled Novel" in Japan.

Rating:  5/5

The Burning Wire (A Lincoln Rhyme Thriller) by Jeffery Deaver

This book has two plots:

1)  Symbiotic terrorist cells, cumulonimbus communications and an invisible suspect with an invisible weapon and

2)  an attempt to trap Richard Logan AKA the Watchmaker (a criminal who got away the last time) in Mexico City.  No clues except for a mysterious circuit board, its owner's manual and two meaningless numbers, 570 and 379.

Does that sound like your kind of book?  Do the two cases eventually merge or are they two separate cases for Lincoln Rhyme and his entourage?

There are a lot of mixed reviews about Deaver's latest and ninth Lincoln Rhyme book on the internet.  Apart from the fact that I had to check the publication date a couple of times in the beginning to make sure that it was published in 2010 and that it was Deaver's latest book as it seemed a touch predictable in places, I would highly recommend The Burning Wire.  Deaver is a genius writer, one of my absolute favourites and has a permanent position at the top of my bookshelf and I look forward to his new James Bond book, Carte Blanche, out on 26 May 2011 in the UK and on 14 June 2011 in the USA and Canada.

The author introduces The Burning Wire with an electrifying ending (you have been warned):



Visit the author's official website or you can like him on Facebook or you can willingly follow him on the ubiquitous Twitter for further information.

Rating:  5/5

Mandarin Plaid (A Lydia Chin/Bill Smith Novel) by S J Rozan

George Pelecanos has called Shira Judith Rozan's Lydia Chin/Bill Smith books "the most consistently compelling series of traditional detective novels published in this decade."  Rozan has won most of crime fiction's greatest honours like the Edgar, Shamus, Anthony, Macavity, and Nero Awards.

The plot in this book is bland and the list of suspects is very short but nevertheless, it is testimony to Rozan's exceptional talent that she can produce a very entertaining story out of so little.  Pay attention to her excellent writing.  Highly recommended.

To view description, reviews and Chapter 1 from Mandarin Plaid (1996), the third in the Lydia Chin/Bill Smith series, click here which will bring you pronto to the author's website.

Rating:  5/5

The Black Ice (A Detective Harry Bosch Novel) by Michael Connelly (1993)

My favourite excerpt from the book:  (from Chapter Eleven) ...Out over Studio City, Bosch could see a police helicopter circling, a shaft of white light cast downward on a crime scene somewhere.  It almost seemed as if the beam was a leash that held the circling craft from flying high and away.

He loved the city most at night.  The night hid many of the sorrows.  It silenced the city yet brought deep undercurrents to the surface.  It was in this dark slipstream that he believed he moved most freely.  Behind the cover of shadows.  Like a rider in a limousine, he looked out but no one looked in.

There was a random feel to the dark, the quirkiness of chance played out in the blue neon night.  So many ways to live.  And to die.  You could be riding in the back of a studio's black limo, or just as easily the back of the coroner's blue van.  The sound of applause was the same as the buzz of a bullet spinning past your ear in the dark.  That randomness.  That was L.A.

Backcover blurb:  The corpse in the hotel room appears to be that of a missing LAPD narcotics officer.  Rumours abound that the cop had crossed over - selling a new drug called Black Ice that had been infiltrating LA from Mexico - and the LAPD brass are quick to declare his death a suicide.

Detective Hieronymus 'Harry' Bosch isn't so sure.  Prompted by odd, inexplicable details from the crime scene - and an undeniable attraction to the cop's widow - Bosch starts his own maverick investigation.  An investigation that soon leads him over the border to Mexicali and into a dangerous labyrinth of shifting identities and deadly corruption.

My thoughts:  I am dedicating the month of March to one of my favourite writers of all time, Michael Connelly, and will be reading his earlier books starting with The Black Ice first published in 1993.  Connelly received the Maltese Falcon Award, Japan's highest honour in the mystery field, from the Maltese Falcon Society of Japan in 1995 for The Black Ice - the best hardboiled novel published in Japan.  Simply reviewed, it is cleverly plotted and is a highly credible story.

Thanks to my library for providing the book and for their kind help.

Rating:  5/5

The Embrace of Harlots by David T K Wong

Today is Chap Goh Meh (Hokkien dialect, literally "fifteenth night") which marks the last day of the Chinese Lunar New Year.  As with Chinese New Year Eve, this night sees a gathering of families around the table for a big eat.  Offerings, cultural performances, lion dances, prayers and others are also held on a grand scale as well as the lighting-up of firecrackers and fireworks.  All in all, it is a night of fun and gaiety.

To mark this special day and night, I am going to read my final and eighth Chinese-themed book of this month, The Embrace of Harlots (out since December 2010, 574 pages) by David T K Wong.  I bought this book from mph bookstore in Kuala Lumpur while on holiday in December 2010.

About the author:  David T K Wong was born in Hong Kong and received his early education in China, Singapore and Australia.  He has degrees in political science and journalism from Stanford University in America and a postgraduate diploma in public administration from the Institute of Social Studies at The Hague, and was a Fellow in Economics at Queen Elizabeth House at Oxford.

He worked as a journalist in Hong Kong, London and Singapore for a number of years before joining the Administration Service of the Hong Kong Government.  After retirement he became the Managing Director of an international trading firm for nine years before embarking on a writing career.  He is now resident in Malaysia.

He is also the founder of the annual David T K Wong Fellowship in Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia in the UK.  The Fellowship awards £26 000 to each successful candidate writing a work of fiction set in the Far East in the English language.  You can find out more about the author by clicking on the author's website.

His other works are Hong Kong Stories (1996), Lost River and Other Stories (2000, currently out of print), Connections - Stories of East Asia (2001), The Evergreen Tea House (2003) and Chinese Stories in Times of Change (2009).

About the story:  I like this review posted on the backcover by Jon Cook, Professor of Literature, University of East Anglia, UK -

"David Wong's new novel begins on an intimate scale, exploring the lives of a well-to-do family living in Hong Kong just before the ending of colonial rule.  He charts their guilts, desires, ambitions and memories, showing in compelling detail how they live together and apart.  Through the recollections and thoughts of the novel's principal character, Suen, the story moves from an intimate scale to encompass social and historical themes:  the history of Hong Kong in the twentieth century, the destructive effects of financial greed, the problems and the opportunities of living with different and opposing cultural values.

The novel ranges widely in both time and space, moving from Hong Kong to London, Oxford and Paris.  It engages with some of the central dilemmas of modern life, but is also full of vivid characterisation and narrative surprises.  It is written in the distilled and elegant style that has become a hallmark of David Wong's stories."

My take:  This is a beautifully told story of a life of a man who is fortunate enough to live his life in riches but at the same time, has to learn to deal with hardships and sufferings just as much as the next person.  After all, money does not shield anyone, rich and poor, from life's pitfalls.

This book contains much of everything you can expect in a good book - love, hate, loss, the tug-of-war between traditional and contemporary cultures, Eastern and Western lifestyles, the uncertainty of a fast and ever-changing world, abuse of justice, the divide between poverty and avarice, clashing cultures, prejudices, politics, thought-provoking discussions about the meaning of life, regrets, human ambitions and desires, religion, etc, and most notably, the characters who make the story believable and personal.

The author's depth of understanding Man's greedy and self-centred nature is evident throughout and he has done an excellent job of telling us a truly worthy and valuable story based on a Chinese family in Hong Kong.  The gist of the story is that life is fleeting, difficult, full of uncertainties and unsolvable dilemmas, whether one is laden with money and power to last a few lifetimes or whether one lives in a hovel, whether you are a good person or a bad one, no one is immuned to the vagaries of life.  

A book that can make you think is a good book and I personally think this is one.  I therefore highly recommend it.

You can watch videos of the author reading from his book on youtube.

Rating:  5/5

Brothers by Yu Hua

With the Chinese New Year festival still ongoing, I would like to introduce one of the most talked about novels in China by one of the most respected and contemporary novelists in China.  Brothers contains a whopping 641 pages and has been shortlisted for the 2008 Man Asian Literary Prize.


About the author:  Yu Hua was born in 1960 in Zhejiang, China.  He finished high school during the Cultural Revolution and worked as a dentist for five years before beginning to write in 1983.  He's since published four novels, six story and three essay collections, and his work has been translated into French, German, Italian, Dutch, Spanish, Japanese, and Korean.  In 2002, he became the first Chinese writer to win the prestigious James Joyce Foundation Award, and two of his novels - To Live and Chronicles of a Blood Merchant - were listed in the top ten most influential Chinese books of the last decade.  His other works are Cries in the Drizzle and The Past and the Punishments.  Yu Hua now lives in Beijing.

Brothers is translated from the Chinese by Eileen Cheng-yin Chow and Carlos Rojas.

My thoughts:  What a novel!  The two brothers, or rather stepbrothers, are like chalk and cheese.  The eldest, Song Gang, is timid and introverted and the youngest, Baldy Li, is bold and an extrovert.  They have a strong relationship where, ironically, the extrovert brother usually rules over the introvert brother while the introvert brother would give the extrovert brother "his last piece of clothing and his last bowl of rice."  In any event, their tight-knit relationship eventually became undone by their love for the most beautiful girl in town.  Aside from that, the brothers are very much likeable even with their differing personalities.  Best of all, they are right down hilarious and they are probably the best examples to help you understand Chinese humour!

I have laughed and cried with the characters in this book or to put it mildly, Brothers has moved me to new heights of literary stimulation.  I do not think it is a book which appeals particularly to everyone but I may be wrong.  According to the translators (taken from the preface of the book), "...Brothers is flashy, blunt, and often deliberately repetitive, yet has moments of sublime beauty and gut-wrenching pathos.  It uses a combination of subversive humour and haunting sentimentality to chronicle contemporary China's transition from socialist austerity to capitalist hyperbole...

In addition to everything else, Brothers is "about parents and children, and the lengths to which parents will go to protect their children from a world gone mad..." and I cannot agree more wholeheartedly than their respected opinions.  Do read it for its own sake.  I think you will enjoy it as much as I did.

Below, I have assembled some videos and articles which I find interesting about the author and the book and I hope you will get something useful out of them:

1)  A video of Yu Hua discussing life before and during the China's economic boom produced by James Wang on The New York Times, 2009:

http://video.nytimes.com/video/2009/05/08/books/1194840083927/an-interview-with-yu-hua.html

2)  A Newsweek profile of the author:

http://www.newsweek.com/2009/03/20/talking-about-his-generation.html

3)  An article entitled "The Bonfire of China's Vanities" published 23 January 2009:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/magazine/25hua-t.html?_r=1

4)  An NPR interview with the author:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104435507

Rating:  5/5

Chinatown Beat (A Detective Jack Yu Investigation) by Henry Chang

First paragraph of the book:  Johnny Wong pulled the black Lincoln over, onto the sidewalk halfway down the narrow street, territory of the Hip Chings.  It was nine in the evening and before he could kill the engine they appeared, the stocky mustached man they called Uncle Four and the fragile Hong Kong lady, Mona.  They were in the car before he could get out and open the door, the man motioning to him with a jerk of his hand.

Backcover blurb:  Jack Yu is the only Chinese-American detective assigned to New York's Chinatown.  To catch a serial rapist and solve a murder he must resort to both modern technology and a local fortune teller's prediction.

Review by January Magazine, 2007:  "Chang's debut novel is one of this year's most impressive.  Here, the object isn't to figure out whodunit...  The suspense comes from tracking Jack Yu through his investigation, navigating the shifting tides of Chinese turf wars, generational tension, and his own internal struggle with being a 'standup Chinaman' and an effective cop.  This is a character well worth knowing."

My thoughts:  The first book of the Detective Jack Yu Investigation series is not as engrossing as its sequel, The Year of the Dog, but as far as debuts go, it is fair.  While I think that you have to keep your wits about you to be able to keep up with the plots, Chang is an author worth watching out for.  His writing style has a lot of potential in which The New York Times Book Review described as "cool and measured."  Having read two of Chang's books, I can honestly say that his protagonist is a true Chinaman - meaning he may present a good front as a NY detective to protect and to serve but he keeps his cards close to his chest.  I find it hard to warm to him.  I will still look out for Chang's future books though because I sense there is more to come as the series progresses.  Both of Chang's books are bought off of Amazon.co.uk.  Happy continue-reading!

Rating:  3/5

Year of the Dog (A Detective Jack Yu Investigation) by Henry Chang

I continue my Chinese-themed read with the above book by a relatively unknown author.

About the author:  Henry Chang was born and raised in New York's Chinatown where he still lives.  He is a graduate of Pratt Institute and City College of New York (CCNY).  He has apparently been called "the Dashiell Hammett of Chinatown".  His two novels in the Jack Yu series - Chinatown Beat (2006) and Red Jade (2010) - have been published to critical acclaim.  Year of the Dog (2008) is his second book in the Detective Jack Yu Investigation trilogy.  Chang is now working on a new Detective Jack Yu sextet which will bring the protagonist around the world and also New York City.

More can be learned on the author's Chinatown trilogy website or you can read Murder on Mott Street published in The New York Times in the year 2008.

Videos that encompass his noir trilogy:





Backcover blurb:  There are Chinatowns in many different countries all around the globe.  But wherever they are located geographically, Chinatown is one community.  Jack Yu, American-born, became one of the few ethnically Chinese officers in the NYPD.  Now Jack has been promoted out of the Chinatown Precinct.  But he cannot get away from Chinatown's criminals - his old friends.

First paragraph in the book:  The Ninth Precinct started at the East River, and ran west to Broadway.  On the north it was bounded by Fourteenth Street; on the south, Houston.  Within these confines, the neighborhoods were the East Village, Loisaida, NoHo, Alphabet City, and Tompkins Square.  Anarchists, artists, students, and the low-income working class all lived together, sometimes tenuously, until their breaking points made the Daily News headlines.

Last word in:  I will be back with more Chinese-themed books soon and hope that you are busy reading just as I am!

Rating:  4/5

Taikor by Khoo Kheng-Hor

Definition of taikor:  Chinese (Cantonese dialect) word, meaning "big brother", sometimes used as a respectful mode of address accorded a secret society leader.


About the author:  Khoo Kheng-Hor (1956- ), born in Penang, Malaysia, had lived an exciting and fulfilling life as a journalist, business executive, author, management consultant, honorary police officer, and international conference speaker.

He has since retired to Cameron Highlands, Pahang in Malaysia to live in seclusion with his wife, Judy, and his four-legged son, Bandit, a Yorkshire terrier, both of whom had sadly passed away since.  There, amid the tranquility of the countryside, he turns to creative fiction writing, after having published 15 books and 9 handbooks on business and management.  His other novels are Mamasan, Nanyang, Sifu and The Four-Sided Tower:  Tales from Penang's Underworld, a collection of 12 short stories released recently in December 2010.

Although he now lives in the mountains, he still maintains contact with the world through his website.

First line in the book:  Shortly after eleven o'clock in the morning, the funeral procession was ready to start.

Backcover blurb:  A historical saga that brings back the past for those who could still remember and for the young who may wish to know how things used to be in the years between 1922 and 1982.

From the beginning in prewar British-ruled Malaya, the story revolves around the life of a boy as he grows to manhood.  It traces the migration of his family from South Thailand to Penang after his father passes away, his brief childhood living with his young widowed mother who subsequently remarried, and thereafter his banishment as a youngster by his stepfather to war-torn Shanghai.

On his return, he had to find a way to earn a living and thereafter, to survive the bloody days of the Japanese Occupation.  Even after the surrender of the Japanese, there was the lawless postwar period, from which he saw opportunities to eventually emerge as a taikor (big brother) in Penang's chaotic underworld.  Apart from opportunities, the postwar years also saw dangers, like the Emergency period when Communist insurgents tried to destabilize the country's development.

Finally, a nation was born when Malaya became an independent sovereign State.  And just as the new nation strived to build a future from its historical legacy, the taikor sought to break away from his past involvement in triad activities to build a new life for himself and his family.

Taikor has been nominated for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award in 2006.  It is a typical Malaysian saga comprising valour, honour, suspense, betrayal and love.

Rating:  3/5

Shanghai Girls by Lisa See

First paragraph in the book:  "Our daughter looks like a South China peasant with those red cheeks," my father complains, pointedly ignoring the soup before him.  "Can't you do something about them?"

Backcover blurb:  Shanghai, 1937.  Pearl and May are two sisters from a bourgeois family.  Though their personalities are very different - Pearl is a Dragon sign, strong and stubborn, while May is a true Sheep - adorable and placid - they are inseparable best friends.  Both are beautiful, modern and living a carefree life ... until the day their father tells them that he has gambled away the family's wealth, and that in order to repay his debts he must sell the girls as wives to two "Gold Mountain" men:  Americans.

As Japanese bombs fall on their beloved city, the two sisters set out on the journey of a lifetime, one that will take them through the villages of southern China, in and out of the clutches of brutal soldiers, and even across the ocean, through the humiliation of an anti-Chinese detention centre to a new, married life in Los Angeles's Chinatown.  Here they begin a fresh chapter, despite the racial discrimination and anti-Communist paranoia, because now they have something to strive for:  a young, American-born daughter, Joy.

Along the way there are terrible sacrifices, impossible choices and one devastating, life-changing secret, but through it all the two heroines of this astounding new novel by Lisa See hold fast to who they are - Shanghai girls.


About the author:  Lisa See is the author of five previous novels, including the critically acclaimed New York Times bestsellers Peony in Love and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, Flower Net (which was nominated for an Edgar Award), The Interior, and Dragon Bones.  She is also the author of the widely acclaimed memoir On Gold Mountain.  The Organization of Chinese American Women named her the 2001 National Woman of the Year.  She lives in Los Angeles.  Shanghai Girls is a work of historical fiction.  Have a lookout for her new book, Dreams of Joy, the sequel to Shanghai Girls due to be released on 31 May 2011.

You can find out lots more information about the author, her books, appearances, reviews, amazing photos, etc on her official website and as well as on flickr.

Here is Lisa See with rather interesting tidbits on her book:



This video is in six parts of when she was in La Jolla, California on 2 July 2009 on the last leg of the Shanghai Girls book tour:













Rating:  5/5

A Bitter Feast (Bill Smith/Lydia Chin novels) by S J Rozan

The Chinese people do know how to work hard and play hard.  By playing hard, I mean that they celebrate the Spring Festival or Chinese New Year in big style up to fifteen days long, that is a whole two weeks with plenty of food, food, food.  Pretty impressive.

To continue the theme of this most important and longest festivity in the Chinese Calendar, I have decided to read books of a Chinese nature be it food, culture, language, people, crime fiction, whatever so long as the books contain Chinese elements, for as long as the festivity lasts.  And so, here is Bitter Feast by S J Rozan (1998), the fifth book in the Bill Smith/Lydia Chin series.

Try a taste of the first chapter here.

Because I am blissfully reading through the Bill Smith/Lydia Chin series, I will not be putting my thoughts down here.  Basically, they read the same in that it is a highly recommended series and that is probably an understatement when it comes to Rozan, a very talented writer.  But I will leave you with a review that takes the words right out of my mouth:

"Superlative...a story that manages to satisfy all the senses." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Rating:  5/5

Sweet Offerings by Chan Ling Yap

Synopsis:  Set between the late 1930s and 1960s, this is the tale of Mei Yin, a young Chinese girl from an impoverished family.  Her destiny is shaped when she is sent to Kuala Lumpur to become the ward and companion of the tyrannical and bitter Su Hei who is looking for a suitable wife for her son Ming Kong ... and ultimately a grandson and heir to the family dynasty.

Sweet Offerings is not just a fictional story of the events that ripped one family apart, but a taste of Malaysia's historical, political and cultural changes during its transition from colonial rule to independence and beyond.

My thoughts:  I picked this book to read to herald in the year of the metal rabbit celebrated by Chinese people all over the world on 3 February 2011.  Yes, it is Chinese New Year!  We welcome this festival which observes age-old traditions meant to attract wealth, prosperity, success, joy, peace and good health for all.

This book is full of Malaysian flavour in the way it is written, the evocation of place and time, the ambience, the insight into its racial and cultural ties, descriptions of places and scenes, the languages (multilingualism) and the indigenous food that induces hunger pangs and curiosity.  A very down-to-earth book with down-to-earth characters whom you cannot help but be drawn to.  It has certainly been an absorbing and enjoyable read.  I agree with this reader's comments.

I also cannot help but be aware that most books by Malaysian and even Singaporean authors are largely based on the past especially from or around the time of colonial rule to its independence.  I appreciate that that period of time in Malaysia is significant to its peoples and I do enjoy reading and re-reading different versions by different authors but my concern is that there is hardly any crime fiction books in Malaysia, Shamini Flint being the only author I know who has published three of her Inspector Singh series set in Asia.  Perhaps there will be a comparable balance in the near future as more and more local authors come to realize this deficit.  An interesting essay by Shamini Flint about the lack of crime fiction in Malaysia can be read here.

I purchased this book during my trip to Kuala Lumpur two months ago.  More information on the author, reviews or extracts of the book can be found on the Sweet Offerings' website.

About the author:  Born in Kuala Lumpur, Chan Ling Yap was educated in Malaysia and subsequently in England where she obtained a PhD in Economics.  She lectured at the University of Malaya before joining the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome, where she worked for nearly two decades.  She now lives in the UK with her husband and two grown-up children.

A widely published author of various textbooks and technical papers, her foray into fiction was highly praised for its beautiful evocation of Asia.

For more information, visit chanlingyap.com

Rating:  3/5