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The Piano Teacher by Janice Y.K. Lee

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Amanda
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Joined: August 2008
Location: Sydney, Australia

The Piano Teacher by Janice Y.K. Lee

Post by Amanda » Wed March 18th, 2009, 1:49 am

Set in Hong Kong, in two time periods, during WWII and about 10 years after. Starts out with a nice writing style, that really kept me reading. Hong Kong was (and is) a melting pot of cultures, and here we see the British Colonials, the properous Westerners, the local business men, the local servants, and then the Eurasian. The book is very much about black and white, versus grey areas. We have a beautiful Eurasian socialite Trudi, who doesn't feel like she fits into a particular place in society, and her relationship with Will, a British national who finds himself round up in the Stanley Internment Camp when Hong Kong is captured by the Japanese. Due to Trudi's background, she stays out of the camp. As the book plays out, there is the mystery of what happened to Trudi, as it is clear from the chapters set after the war that she is no longer around. The details of the Internment Camp, and the anarchy of life of the remaining citizens is quite harrowing. There is also Claire, a newlywed naive young British women that accompanies her husband to Hong Kong after the war, and seems to find that she is reinventing herself.
One of the big themes is the question of being a collaborator with the enemy. Were do you draw the line between collaborating, and survival? And different people judge and are judged differently.
I found it to be a quick read, as I kept wanting to find out what happened to everyone. I did feel that the ending was a little flat. Hard to say why though.

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diamondlil
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Joined: August 2008

Post by diamondlil » Wed March 18th, 2009, 10:12 am

I've had this on my list for a while now! Thanks for the review.
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