Word: novelled
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...LUCK CLUB by Amy Tan (Putnam; $18.95). A bright, sharp-flavored first novel on growing up ethnic in the U.S. The topic sounds familiar, but the Chinese spice added to this old recipe is invigorating and refreshingly true...
Through the miracle of literary hindsight, the mess of two decades is foreseen by a sawed-off Christly caricature, Owen Meany, a New Hampshire granite quarrier's son who speaks in capital letters and believes the sacrificial arc of his life has been plotted by God. The novel's narrator is John Wheelwright, Meany's prep-school mate and eventually his leading apostle...
Despite its theological proppings, A Prayer for Owen Meany is a fable of political predestination. As usual, Irving delivers a boisterous cast, a spirited story line and a quality of prose that is frequently underestimated, even by his admirers. On the other hand, the novel invites trespass by symbol hunters. One can easily imagine college sophomores arguing over the meaning of a stuffed armadillo that has had its claws removed, or the significance of Wheelwright's carrying his small friend on his shoulders to slam-dunk a basketball. For graduate students there is the fact that Meany shares more than...
...Chinese-American culture is only beginning to throw off such literary sparks, and Amy Tan's bright, sharp-flavored first novel belongs on a short shelf dominated by Maxine Hong Kingston's remarkable works of a decade or so ago, The Woman Warrior and China Men. Tan's book is a wry group portrait of four elderly and feisty women who emigrated from China to the U.S., and their grown, very Americanized daughters. "A girl is like a young tree," says one of the stern mothers, who explains to her daughter that she lacks the necessary wood in her character...
...Chinese (or Jewish or Presbyterian) mother broods when an adult offspring says, "I'm my own person!" Her response is, "How can she be her own person? When did I give her up?" The author writes with both inside and outside knowing, and her novel rings clearly, like a fine porcelain bowl...