Plant Your Feet Firmly by Marie Chow

When I saw the term "Asian-American" in the book description, I immediately requested it. Although I'm not an ABC (American Born Chinese), I'm a Singaporean-Chinese. So I do have an interest in the other groups. After all, Asian-Americans and non-Mainland Chinese are rather different from each other (and from Mainland Chinese, and Hong Kong-ers and Taiwanese), so I was really interested in learning more about them.

Since this is an anthology, I decided to review them separately, looking at:
a. How much I enjoyed it
b. How 'Asian-American' it was.

Cosmetics - Basically a series of letters from a grandfather to his granddaughter. I must admit, while I thought the grandfather was adorable, I didn't understand how this relates to Asian-Americans. The most is the mention of "Orientals" vs "Asian Americans". It seems more to be a work of grandfatherly-granddaughterly bond and technology.

Mothers and Wives - Again, I don't see the Asian American connection here (are the protagonists even of Asian descent?). I did enjoy the look into the lives of three very different women though, as they gossip about their friend, and reflect on their past.

Something Positive, Something Encouraging - The wife is Asian, so yay! But this book is basically about a guy as he contemplates an affair/how he came really close to an affair, because his marriage seems to be breaking down. I suppose it's a look at inter-ethnic marriages.

Plant Your Feet Firmly, On Two Moving Boats - The titular story, and the one I enjoyed the most. It's an interesting look at the life of an Asian American, in all its complexity. It reminded me of the movie It's a Mad Mad Mad World 2. The list form that it's written in seems particularly appropriate.

Eulogy - After Plant Your Feed Firmly, this was sort of a let down. I didn't understand the point of the story. It seems to be people reacting to the death of another person, but... I don't get it. The second person narrative doesn't help either. It didn't seem particularly Asian-American

Laughter - The second marriage story. It doesn't seem Asian-American related in any way. I don't really like either person in this marriage, and I had a hard time feeling sympathy or connecting with them.

The Fourth Player - A story with a lot of potential. It looks at an eccentric Chinese lady (from Mainland China, but escaped to Taiwan), who makes up the fourth person in a mahjong group. Told through the eyes of her nosy group mates, the story only hints at the complexities in the family. I wish this story was elaborated (perhaps into a novel), because it holds the potential for a lot of depth. As it is now, it barely scratches the surface.

All in all, most of the stories do not seem connected to the Asian-American community. The Mad Mad Mad World movies (movies two and later) are probably a better (although dated) option. If this book was merely marketed as an anthology (although I'm not sure with what sort of theme, since they all seem rather disparate), I would have enjoyed it more, but as it is, I was let down by the absence of Asian-American themes.

Disclaimer: I got this review from the author via BookBlogging in exchange for a free and honest review.

Gears of Wonderland by Jason G. Anderson

Apart from fairy-tale retellings, I really like books that retell, or are based on, Alice in Wonderland (so much material to work with!). When I saw this book in BookBlogging, the pretty cover instantly caught my eye, and the blurb sounded so enticing! And happily, the book lived up to my expectations.

James Riggs is a pushover. His boss bullies him, his fiancee is getting him to give up his favourite activities. So at the start of the book, his boss's plans and his fiance's plans collide, forcing James to just get away from them. He goes to his old friend Melvin, but sadly, Melvin is killed right in front of his eyes, and James is transported to some weird Victorian-style country.

Wonderland. It's not the same Wonderland that Alice went to, it's the Wonderland that Alice changed by virtue of being an Outsider. And the paranoid despot is desperate to catch him. In a stroke of luck, Kara, the daughter of the Mad Hatter and the first person who runs into James has ties to the resistance, and they start off on a wild and crazy adventure, aided occasionally by the White Rabbit.

The conflict in this novel comes from the rebellion and, more importantly, Jame's internal conflict. James has been pushed around for so long that he doesn't want to save Wonderland. All he wants to do is to go home where everything is safe and familiar. Through his journey, James has to find in him, the strength that everyone needs, since for some reason, they're all counting on him.

For me, my favourite character in this book wasn't James, but Torre. Torre is an elite knight from the now-defeated Red Heart Kingdom, and his loyalty to his now dead King was really touching. Plus, his character really develops in the last few chapters, and he becomes more than the touchy, prickly knight that first met James and Kara.

Speaking of James and Kara, I found their romance to be very predictable. Thankfully, it didn't take up much of the book, although I suspect that the next book will talk about it more. But since it's not instalove, I'm looking forward to seeing how the author will handle their romance. I'd also like to know much more about Kara in the next book - there simply isn't enough backstory about her in this book.

All in all, I really like this retelling. I enjoyed this version of Wonderland, and the adventure was fun and easy to read.

Disclaimer: I got a free copy of this book from the author via BookBlogging in exchange for a free and honest review.

The Sandman by Alex Stargazer

This book sounded so good. I mean, an unconventional heroine, a mysterious entity (the Sandman), the two meeting. It had the trappings of a good bildungsroman. But, the book really disappointed me.

Now this book grew out of a an English GCSE paper. Nothing wrong with that, stories have come from stranger places, and I remember enjoying writing stories during my O Levels. But, this story is just too short.

First, is Leila an unconventional person ("everything a girl like her shouldn't be")? All we have as proof is that she doesn't want to marry an odious man in her village. Name me one girl who will gladly marry a man she doesn't like. This shows nothing about her. After all, did she take any concrete steps to get out of the marriage? No. She just followed the sound of a child's voice and got lost. All we have to know that Leila is unconventional is that the author has told us. Even though this story is short, the character building could have been so much better if Leila started her journey by defying her father rather than just getting lost. She does end by resolving to tell her father that "life was for people. Money was for cowards", but resolve is fine and dandy. Many people resolve to do things. Then they break them. We call these New Year Resolutions. Again, it shows nothing.

Second, is the Sandman the symbol of critical thought? All we have to go is by his own self-description and one statement about Adam and Even (that Adam was afraid of Eve because she knew things he didn't). I'm going to leave aside the theology criticism because the Bible (and I suppose the Q'uran as well) doesn't give us a clear motive. If you're interested, you can read this article.

To me, this isn't enough. I can call myself "the modern day Helen of Troy", but that doesn't mean I'm beautiful. Or, I can call myself "the biggest book blogger" and cite one tiny award I win, but that doesn't mean anything. To put it simply, the Sandman suffers from the same problem as Leila - they are not fully explored.

At the end of the book, the author analyses his own paper and tells you "what to take away from this." This, in my view, is a no-no. Books are meant to inspire questions, not have the authors tell you exactly what they mean. As a former Literature student, I'm pretty sure that my interpretation of any text would have been hampered if the author came out and told me "I wrote this book with this message." In my view, the author should have used the extra pages to build on the story, instead of expounding his message. Curious readers can do the interpretation and analysis for themselves, thank you very much.

To sum, the failing of this book is that it over-reaches itself. As a short story, it might work if the characters were given a bit more character, or the issue explored more fully. But, it tries to do both, and that's where the book fails - it doesn't get the chance to explore anything fully. Add that to an unnecessary analysis, and the book goes from a "short story with potential" to "a story that tries to be deep but comes across as pretentious (at least to me)."

Disclaimer: I received this book from the author through BookBlogging in exchange for a free and honest review.