The Bonesetter’s Daughter by Amy Tan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I wanted to reread The Joy Luck Club because we were talking about it in my book club and I remembered how well the movie adaptation and it had been a while since I had read the book. Go figure, I looked at my library and both the digital and physical copy were checked out. I’m actually still waiting on my digital copy, but while looking at The Joy Luck Club, Libby pulled up all of Amy Tan’s work and here was this lovely.
I read the synopsis of a tumultuous relationship between mother and daughter and how once finding LuLing’s story, Ruth’s perception changes and I was intrigued. I love Amy Tan’s attention to mother/daughter relationships and decided to give this one a read while waiting for my copy of The Joy Luck Club.
This story is heart-breaking and beautiful all at the same time. It teaches us the lesson of how we cannot truly empathize with someone or understand their actions without knowing their story. How, sometimes, our mothers or grandmothers seem cruel and don’t understand our lives, but they are really trying their best to look out for us and give us the opportunities they weren’t given.
LuLing’s life was far from easy and it was painful to read her story at times. It was so wonderfully written to the point that I had to constantly remind myself that I wasn’t reading a memoir or work of nonfiction, which is a testament to Tan’s amazing storytelling skill.
I also loved the attention to culture. Just like in The Joy Luck Club, Tan focused on the differences in how LuLing was raised and how she in turn raised Ruth in America. Culture plays a significant role in why LuLing focused on things that Ruth never understood until she learned more about her mother’s history.
And just like with real life, there wasn’t a cut and dry happy ending. LuLing’s past is no longer hidden, but she still forgets more and more each day. Ruth understands her mother better, but it was almost too late.
In the end, I wanted more and felt like I needed more closure for LuLing and Ruth. I’m sure it was left the way it was for a reason, but I just wanted to be sure LuLing would be okay. I need to know she’s okay because I became invested in LuLing’s past, present, and future. There was also a chunk in the middle of the novel where it lost me and the rhythm slowed a bit too much for my liking.
Other than that, it was a truly wonderful story to watch unfold. The past and the present were blended evenly to not be confusing but rather add to the overall story. Part of me wants this made into a movie and the other part of me would hate for such a beautiful tale to be ruined during an adaptation.
Under Literary Construction 