Book Review: Willow Trees Don't Weep by Fadia Faqir

Dear readers, let me start this post with a quick apology. I'm sorry that this post didn't go up on Wednesday as planned, my only excuse being that this has been quite a busy week with job interviews and applications. Thankfully things have calmed down a bit now, leaving me with the time to give this post the attention it deserves. 

As I mentioned in the last post, this July I set out to read Fadia Faqir's novel Willow Trees Don't Weep by the middle of this month, a task I can now say was successful. I actually finished the book on around the 10th July, leaving me with enough time to finish another novel (the devastating Here Comes the Sun by Nicole Dennis-Benn) before it came time to start my second West Asian novel of the month. 

Let me not get off track though. This post is specifically about Willow Trees Don't Weep, not Here Comes the Sun or The Beauty of Your Face - although I'm sure that they are deserving of their own posts.

Willow Trees Don't Weep is a novel by Jordanian-British author Fadia Faqir, published in 2014. Its plot follows Najwa, a young woman in Amman whose family is left struggling after the death of her mother. Her father, Omar, abandoned his family to join the so-called "global jihad" when Najwa was just a baby, leaving Najwa and her grandmother to fend for themselves after Najwa's mother passes away. Fearing for their safety as lone women in a patriarchal society, Najwa and her grandmother decide that Najwa must leave Jordan and go to find her father. This quest takes her around the world, from Pakistan to England, following in the footsteps of her father as she tries to find out what happened to him. 

One of the things I liked most about this book was the character of Najwa. I thought she was an interesting, complex person, and I found her relatable even though her struggles were unlike anything I've ever experienced. Her mother renounced Islam and became determinedly secular after Omar left, associating Islam with the loss of her husband. This means that Najwa grows up feeling conflicted about her religious identity, torn between her mother's secularism and her grandmother's faith, while also being uncomfortably aware of the impact religion had on her father's path in life. 

On her journey, Najwa fluctuates between determination to continue to search for her father and teetering on the edge of a mental breakdown. I liked that Najwa came across as resilient without being stoic, and the way that her journey was not easy for her made it seem that much more realistic to me. Likewise, I appreciated Najwa's ambivalence towards her father. On one hand, she is actively seeking him out, missed his presence during her childhood, and wants him to come home to Jordan. On the other hand, she hates him for abandoning his family, for causing her suffering, and for the violent acts he took part in as a member of terrorist groups. 

While I appreciated Najwa's ambivalence about her father, I have to admit that my opinion on him was a bit more one-sided. Even though the book is interspersed with Omar's diary entries, starting from when he was in Amman with his wife and child and leading all the way up to his reunion with Najwa, I found him a difficult character to sympathise with. When you read about his experience as a doctor in a war zone, it's hard not to feel upset or nauseated by the descriptions of what he had to do, and of course I felt bad for him when he experienced the loss of those close to him in the fighting. However, I felt I didn't have that great a sense of what motivated him as a person, particularly what would compel him to leave his wife and young child. Omar more or less attributes this to a combination of wanting to protect his friend Hani, who was radicalised in Jordan, and wishing to get away from his nagging wife, but neither of those reasons seemed sufficient to me. They only felt flimsier later, as Omar's actions become worse and he gets ever deeper involved in Islamic totalitarian movements. It might have been enlightening to read from the perspective of someone who became so devoted to this cause and to perhaps understand what could motivate them to do some truly horrible things, but I felt Omar's account fell short of doing this. 

There were other things I liked and disliked about the book which are perhaps less central than these two main characters. I enjoyed the descriptions and imagery, and I found parts of the book very impactful emotionally. I wasn't so keen on the ending, nor the elements of the plot which seemed to pop up and then be more or less disregarded a few chapters later. While the book overall was intriguing and emotional, there was something of an unfinished quality about it. I would perhaps recommend this book to someone who is looking for work by a female Jordanian author, as I was, or to someone who wants to know more about Islamic totalitarianism and/or the conflict in Afghanistan - I can certainly say I came out of this book knowing more than when I went in. Overall, it was a decent book with some important themes, and I don't regret reading it. 

Jordan and West Asia Book Choices (From & About Asia Reading Project)

 As I promised last week, this Wednesday's post is going to focus on my book choices for month three of the From & About Asia reading project. This month is following the usual format whereby participants have to read one book from each of two categories (I will list them below, but for a more in-depth refresher please feel free to check out my masterpost on the project), this time restricted to Jordan and other countries in West Asia. These categories are:

Category I: a book by an author from that country

Category II: a book about the culture of the subregion where the country is from

For Category I, I have been reading Willow Trees Don't Weep by Fadia Faqir, who is a Jordanian woman writer and academic. I generally prefer to read books by women and realised this month that so far less than half of my books chosen for this project have been written by them, so for July I deliberately tried to choose books by women authors. Fadia Faqir is one such writer, but I didn't only choose her book for this reason. It also sounded like a poignant story of a young Jordanian woman who sets out to find her long-lost father, who abandoned his family decades ago to join a Jihadist sect in Central Asia. So far I have been enjoying the book, although parts of it are quite sad to read. I am motivated to keep reading and interested to see where the story goes.

For Category II, I am planning to read The Beauty of Your Face by Sahar Mustafah. While I believe Mustafah was born in America, she comes from a Palestinian family. I was a little hesitant to choose this book because I wasn't sure how much it focuses on the culture of Western Asia, but from what I've seen of reviews, I believe that it is informed by Mustafah's experience as a child of Palestinian immigrants. The protagonist of the book, like Mustafah, is a Palestinian-American woman living in the US. She is the head of a Muslim school for girls, and the story shows her reflecting on her life as a school shooter invades the building. I imagine that this book is not going to be an easy one to read, but at the same time it seems to address some very important issues and I have heard very good things about it. 

While this isn't exactly relevant to my book choices this month, I would like to mention that this is the first month in which I have actually scheduled my reading. In previous months, I just sort of told myself I needed to finish both assigned books by the end of the month, leaving it up to how I felt each day to determine how much I read on a daily basis. This month, I am approaching things a bit differently by giving myself a daily reading requirement: 20 pages a day. While my ebook reader seems determined to sabotage me, by showing my book progress in percentages rather than pages, I think that this breaks down a larger goal (reading two books in one month) into easily achievable chunks (20 pages a day). I have previously used this strategy when completing reading for university, so I am fairly confident it will work. That said, I will wait until the end of this month to judge its effectiveness and if it positively or negatively impacted my reading experience. 

So, that's all I have to share for now! I realise this is quite a short post, but I just wanted to give a quick update about my progress with the project and to let you know which books I am reading this month. There's a chance I may have finished Willow Trees Don't Weep by the time of next week's post, so that blog may well be a review of that book. If not, I suppose the topic will be a surprise!

June Reading Wrap-Up (From & About Asia Reading Project)

 This past month, most of my reading time has been occupied by two books:

- The Dead Lake by Hamid Ismailov 

- Mother Earth by Chingiz Aitmatov

These books constituted my self-assigned reading for the From & About Asia reading project's June reading requirements, which specified that I needed to read one book by an Uzbek author (The Dead Lake) and another book about the culture of Central Asia (Mother Earth). Since I finished these both quite close to the end of this month and so don't have time to write about each book in an individual post, I wanted to use this post as a sort of wrap-up in which I give my thoughts on both. 

Also, if you read the words "From & About Asia reading project" and have no idea what I was talking about, I recommend perusing my masterpost on the project and the posts I've made about it.

Let's start with The Dead Lake, as that is the book I read first out of the two. I mentioned in my previous post about it, which I wrote before actually reading the book, that I expected this to be quite a dark and disturbing book, perhaps even bordering on horror. When reading it, I was surprised to find that the book was definitely not of the horror variety, and it wasn't even as dark or disturbing as I expected. While there is certainly an element of existential horror in the book's key incident, in which a young boy enters a radioactive lake and ceases to grow after that point, there was a lot more to the story than just that. There was also humour, hope, and a lot left to the reader's imagination. 

I felt that The Dead Lake gave an immersive look at what it was like for young Yerzhan to grow up rural Kazakhstan, where global events feel at once incredibly distant and intimately close. When his uncle speaks of "the Americans" and nuclear bombs, it is as though he might as well be talking about aliens, the Cold War seems so far away. Yet when the houses in Yerzhan's area are shaken by test bombs, and his own growth is halted by exposure to radiation, you begin to understand that even a conflict which seems so remote can have devastating effects close to home. I think that the book's central plot point alludes to this deceptive dichotomy: when Yerzhan enters the lake, it is seemingly a minor event, the water showing no clear signs of its danger. The harm of the lake and the Cold War generally might not appear immediately, but that doesn't make them any less destructive.

Despite being written by a different author and set in what is now considered to be a different country, Mother Earth has a number of similarities with The Dead Lake. To start with, both books are set in rural areas of countries that - at the time the story takes place - were considered to be part of the Soviet Union. They both depict the mixture of pride and fear that comes with being part of the Soviet Union and show how the country's struggles (Mother Earth's with war and The Dead Lake's with nuclear weaponry) impact its citizens. While I expected The Dead Lake to be darker, Mother Earth was (in my opinion) the more emotionally devastating of the two. Its plot follows Tolgonai, a Kyrgyz farming woman, as she loses more and more of her family during WWII. Seeing Tolgonai's struggle was heartbreaking, perhaps more so because she always tries to remain a pillar of strength for her community and what is left of her family. The title of the book comes from the framing device used for the story, as it is narrated by Tolgonai through her conversations with a field, through which she speaks to Mother Earth. I thought that using Tolgonai's conversations with the earth in this way was very touching, showing us both the importance of the land to her while also stressing how alone she is. That said, this was not a book without hope. Throughout the story, Tolgonai holds onto the hope of life for her people and her family, and it is this hope which sustains her. 

I think I would recommend both of these books to anyone who wants to learn more about this area of the world and its history, as well as those who can appreciate a story even when it is difficult to read emotionally. Mother Earth was my favourite of the two, but I truly enjoyed both and could see myself reading more works by either Ismailov or Aitmatov. I had never heard of either of these books or authors before the From & About Asia reading project, so once again I'm pleased that this project gave me the opportunity to discover them and appreciate their work.

Next week, I will be continuing with the From & About Asia project by posting my choices for July, the country and region of which are Jordan and Western Asia respectively. So if you are interested in my progress with this project, keep an eye out for next week's post!

Uzbekistan & Central Asia Book Choices (From & About Asia Reading Project)

Note: Apologies for the late post! I wrote this on Wednesday and intended to post it that day, but I felt a bit unwell and basically... forgot to post it. So here it is now, a few days late.

Hello, loyal readers! Welcome back to another update on my progress with the From & About Asia reading project. If this is your first time hearing me mention this project, I recommend having a look at my masterpost here and reading my first post about the project, in which I explain how it works and what I am attempting to do.

For those of you who have been following my reading within the project, you will know that I recently finished last month's readings for May/North Korea/East Asia, and I am now working on my choices for June/Uzebkistan/Central Asia. Although I haven't finished any of June's books yet, I thought it my book choices might be of interest regardless and so I decided to share them here.

At the moment, my choices are as follows:

Category I (a book by an Uzbek author): The Dead Lake by Hamid Ismailov

Category II (a book about the culture of a Central Asian country): Mother Earth by Chingiz Aitmatov

Hamid Ismailov is, from what I understand, one of the most well-known authors to come out of Uzebkistan. This probably explains why his books are much easier to find online than many other Uzbek authors, and also why so many of us in the From & About Asia Discord group are reading his books this month! Interestingly, his books are actually banned in Uzbekistan and the author himself was forced to flee his home country after Islam Karimov's regime accused him of opposing the government (according to Wikipedia).

When googling Ismailov, I was surprised to find that one of his novels, The Devils' Dance, has actually been on my to-read list for years. Sadly, I decided not to read this book for the project as I couldn't find it in ebook form and it seemed a bit too long - I'm trying not to be too ambitious with my reading choices this month. That said, I hope that I might be able to read it in the future if I can get hold of a copy, especially if I enjoy the book I did choose.

In case you were wondering, my alternative Ismailov book choice was The Dead Lake. I came across this novella while searching for Ismailov's works, and the title and the plot summary really grabbed me. Set in Soviet-controlled Kazakhstan, The Dead Lake tells the story of Yerzhan, a boy who is doomed to a sort of eternal youth after a tragic event in his childhood. In an attempt to impress the girl he is in love with, Yerzhan dives into a radioactive lake that has been contaminated by the atomic bombs detonated nearby. This permanently stunts Yerzhan's growth, leaving him forever stuck in the body of a young boy.

While this plot is definitely disturbing, I also found it darkly fascinating. I have never heard of a story quite like this, so I'm intrigued to know where Ismailov will take it. My copy was released as part of the publisher Peirene's Coming of Age series, so I'm guessing that it will be a sort of bildungsroman - albeit one with elements of magical realism and horror, if the summary is anything to go by.

As for my choice for Category II, I have decided to go for Mother Earth by Chingiz Aitmatov. I decided quite early on that I wanted to read a book from Kyrgyzstan, because I have an aunty from there. Mother Earth is actually the book she chose for me after I asked for her reading recommendations, since I figured she probably knows the landscape of Kyrgyz literature better than I do! If you're reading this, thank you for the suggestion Aunty!

I know less about Aitmatov than I do about Ismailov, but from what I understand he is an important figure in Kyrgyz literature. Like Aitmatov, he wrote in Russian (as well as Kyrgyz). There are a few of his books which interest me, particularly his first novel The Day Lasts More Than a Hundred Years, so if I enjoy reading Mother Earth I will have plenty more of his work to explore afterwards!

I believe that Mother Earth is about the struggles of a Kyrgyz woman named Tolgonay, who has lost most of her family during the the Great Patriotic War and afterwards. I don't want to find out too much more in case I see spoilers, but my aunty has warned me this is quite a sad story! I suppose I'll have to read it to find out... but only once I've finished The Dead Lake.

So, those are all my choices for this month's books. I am excited to read both of these, partially because they sound so interesting individually but also because they will be the first books I have ever read from their respective countries. I love reading books from places I've never previously read about, so I'm happy the From & About Asia reading project is giving me the opportunity to do more of that this summer. Hopefully I will finish both of these before the end of the month and probably post book reviews for both of them, so keep an eye out!

Book Review: The Accusation by Bandi (From & About Asia Reading Project)

Hello, and welcome to another post about the From and About Asia Reading Project! Those of you who have read my previous posts about the project (and if you haven't, I recommend perusing my masterpost here) will know that I have been participating in it for the last month. This has meant choosing and reading two books, one for each of the following criteria:

Category I: a book by an author from that month's country

Category II: a book about the culture of the subregion where the country is from

May's country was North Korea, meaning that my Category I choice had to be a book by a North Korean author. For this, I chose The Accusation by Bandi. As for my choice for Category II, I have actually already written a post about the book I selected, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982, which I ended up reading first for reasons I have specified in that review. Hopefully next month I will manage to read the books in what seems to be the correct order! My choices for June will come later, though. For now, let's get back to the topic of The Accusation. 

As far as I can tell, The Accusation is a very unique book in terms of North Korean literature, at least among those books which have been translated into English. While there have been many books written by North Korean defectors, The Accusation is the first I have heard of that was critical of but written by someone still living within the regime. The pseudonymous author, Bandi (whose name means "firefly" in Korean), wrote the collection of short stories secretly and hid his manuscript until a family member who defected was able to help him get it out of the country. The manuscript was then picked up for publication, and the rest is history.

The fact that The Accusation is so unusual made me determined to read it, even though I normally struggle with short story collections. Its stories follow different members of North Korean society as they live life under their country's oppressive dictator. Bandi definitely doesn't hold back from criticising the regime, with every single story drawing attention to its hypocrisy and brutality.

I admit I was a bit surprised by this. Somehow I thought that the stories (at least some of them, anyway) would show the reader a less critical look at daily life in North Korea, showing in some ways the normality of it for those who live inside the system. Instead, I found that the oppression of the North Korean state hung over the stories like thick smoke. It wasn't possible to look for metaphorical gaps in the regime, where perhaps some light might be able to slip through, because its influence was so suffocatingly absolute. It was disturbing to read story after story where the basic humanity of North Koreans was crushed inside the iron fist of the Kims' dictatorship.

For me, the standout story of the collection was definitely "The Stage", a heartbreaking tale of a family fractured by the son's desire to live, in his words, as a human being. A prominent theme in this story was the idea of "stage truth", which is described within the text as: "how actors perform a given play as though it were real life. To lie, in other words, but convincingly, so the audience will believe it is the truth."

Bandi extends this concept of stage truth to the behaviour of North Korean citizens within the regime, who are forced not only to perform whatever actions they are told to but also to do so believably, to convince their superiors that they are doing so out of a true inner devotion to the state and its ideals. I found this to be a very powerful comparison, which Bandi illustrates painfully well. Trying to comprehend the intimate, psychological oppression of the North Korean state is a task as horrible as it seems essential to understanding the lives of its people.

It's sort of difficult to review this book as I would another work of fiction, because I am aware of the horrible reality that inspired Bandi's stories. I feel like it's almost disrespectful to say "this is a great book, 10/10 would recommend", but I do want to say that it was a powerful and insightful book to read. If you are interested in North Korea or want to learn more about the struggles of the North Korean people, I would indeed recommend The Accusation. If the story surrounding the book's origins is true, then we are very lucky that this collection made it out of the country and into English-language publication. Bandi is an incredibly brave writer, and we are all fortunate to be able to read his work.

Book Review: Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-joo (From & About Asia Reading Project)

A few weeks ago, I wrote a blog post about joining the From and About Asia reading project, which requires me to read two books about Asia every month (actually the rules are a bit more complicated than that, but we'll get into more detail in a second). Earlier this week, I had the pleasure of finishing my first assigned book for the project: Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-joo.

For those of you who need a refresher of the project's book criteria, let me give you a quick reminder. Each month focuses on a different country in Asia, May's being North Korea, and then requires you to read one book for each of the following categories:

Category I: a book by an author from that country

Category II: a book about the culture of the subregion where the country is from

Funnily enough, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 actually fits into the second category here, even though I finished it before my Category I choice. The reason for this is that I'm  reading my other North Korea book (The Accusation by Bandi) as part of a buddy read that continues until the end of this month. So, I have somewhat counterintuitively finished my Category II book before it. 

I will admit I was a little confused at first as to what book I should choose for this category. I ended up choosing Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 because I already owned a digital copy, I'd heard other feminist readers rave about it, and I liked the idea of reading one book from North Korea and another about South Korea. It seemed to fit the criteria for a book that looks at an East Asian subculture because it follows the life of the eponymous main character as she navigates life as a woman in South Korea. The story takes us from before her birth to her becoming a mother herself. Along the way, it tackles a variety of issues relating to sexism and patriarchy, all seen through the lens of Jiyoung's experiences.

One of the blurbs inside the book claimed that "Kim Jiyoung's life is made to seem at once totally common-place and nightmarishly over-the-top", which I admit I found quite strange. While I would agree that Jiyoung's life is both commonplace and nightmarish, there is nothing over-the-top about it. Everything she goes through is totally normal, even if the anti-feminist instinct to deny these experiences is so strong that Cho Nam-joo had to include actual citations within the text. Given that the book is written from a South Korean perspective and set in that country, Jiyoung's life is specifically that of a Korean woman, and her experiences with sexism and misogyny reflect that. For example, I think that perhaps the issues of sex-selective abortion and ideas about honour and tradition in families (and how this affects gender relations within them) are perhaps more particularly significant in Korea. 

On the other hand, as the great Mona Eltahawy said, "Patriarchy is universal." So much of what Jiyoung experiences is relatable even to me as a woman who has never so much as visited Korea. Being sexualised from a young age, encountering predatory men as a child, being told that as a girl you can't do things that boys your age are doing, having your choice of clothing constantly analysed and controlled, being harassed by men on the street, being told that this harassment is your own fault, living in constant fear of the violence you know other women like you have experienced, feeling a dull sense of inevitability when you finally experience that violence yourself - all of these are things that Jiyoung, myself, and countless other women worldwide have gone through. 

I know that some people reading this, specifically men, will probably hear my description of the book and think, "I'm not sure this is for me." Maybe you don't like reading so-called "feminist" literature or maybe you just feel like this book would be a bit too intense for your liking. Unfortunately, the women in your life don't have the opportunity to opt-out of sexism and misogyny like you can opt-out of reading a book which focuses on them. If I could, I'd get all the men I know to read this book, if only so they can see (however briefly) the relentless patriarchal onslaught that comes with going through life as a woman.

That's not to say that only men would benefit from reading this book, of course. Reading it as a woman made me feel very validated and vindicated in my anger at systemic sexism. I think this book deserves a place as a new feminist classic for how well and concisely it depicts the reality of being a woman in the modern world. It doesn't depict every single aspect, as I'm sure no book really could, but it depicts the life and experiences of one woman and it does so incredibly well. 

For those who have also read and enjoyed this book, like me, I would like to recommend two other stories you may enjoy. Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 reminded me a lot of The Vegetarian by Han Kang, since both depict Korean women whose conflict with the patriarchal society that surrounds them has manifested itself internally as a mental illness. The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is a short story that shares a similar plotline, albeit from an American perspective. I was also reminded of Min Jin Lee's short story The Best Girls, which I mentioned in a previous post. Like Kim Jiyoung, The Best Girls gave insight into the lives of Korean women and how young women can be expected to make sacrifices for the sake of their brothers, simply by virtue of their gender.

I would like to write more about this book, going through every aspect of patriarchy which is addressed in the novel and talking about how relatable it all was, but to be honest I could not say any of this better than the book does itself. That said, if you'd like to read more of my thoughts, I made a short post about the book on Instagram and also shared a few quotes from it there. Otherwise, I would suggest reading Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 if you want to know more. It's only a short book so it doesn't take long to read, but its impact will stay with you well after the last sentence.

From and About Asia Reading Project

This week, I'm very excited to announce that I have decided to take part in a new reading challenge: the From and About Asia project. The project was started by my favourite booktuber, The Bookish Land. You can hear more about the project and their inspiration for it in the video announcement below and the relevant website page, but I will also try to explain it here.

Essentially, the project chooses a different country from Asia each month, starting in May (Asian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month in the United States). For each country, those participating need to read two books, one for each of the categories below:

Category I: a book by an author from that country

Category II: a book about the culture of the subregion where the country is from

For example, the country chosen for May is North Korea, so the book for category one needs to be written by an author from North Korea. The book for the second category just needs to connected to the culture of North Korea's subregion, Eastern Asia, so it could potentially be a book from or about countries like China, South Korea, or Japan.

I absolutely love this idea and the way it is presented, because it has a clear focus but also allows enough flexibility that everyone can read books appealing to their specific interests. It's always important to read diverse books and books from different countries too. I am also happy to have the opportunity to support and celebrate Asian authors, especially given the recent rise in hate crimes against Asian people worldwide. In short, it's a great project and I'm really excited to be participating.

So, which books will I be reading for the first month? I was a little torn for the first category, since there are several North Korean books I have been wanting to read for a while now, but I think I have finally settled on The Accusation by Bandi. This is a collection of short stories written pseudonymously by a North Korean author still living in the country. I am particularly interested in this book because it was written by someone who continues to live in North Korea, rather than a defector, as the authors of the most popular books about the country (such as Park Yeon-mi and Lee Hyeon-seo) often are. Although both have some appeal, I slightly prefer the idea of reading fiction to a memoir as well. 

I will admit I'm struggling a little bit more with the second category, probably because it's significantly broader. Since I'm anxious to choose a book which doesn't violate the rules of the category, I am considering reading one of the books mentioned specifically in The Bookish Land's video about their North Korea and East Asia book choices: Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng. On one hand, I already have a digital copy of this book (unread of course) and have previously enjoyed Ng's work. On the other hand, I feel this is a slight cop-out. Would it be better to read a book by a new author I haven't previously explored? I am still thinking about this. I will most likely read the book about North Korea first and then come back to this one, but I will be sure to mention my final decision in a later post!

At this point, you might be thinking, "Wow, this sounds so cool! How can I join in?". Well, you can explore The Bookish Land's videos that I embedded above, as well as the page on their website which includes all the details about the challenge. I believe they have also set up a Discord for participants, linked in the descriptions of their videos, but I think that joining that is optional. 

Even if you won't personally be participating, I hope you have enjoyed reading about the project so far and will continue to read my upcoming posts about my progress with it. Once again, I'm so excited to take part in this and learn about new Asian authors. 

Finally, for any Americans reading this: Happy Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month!