The Literary Fiction Shelf

Whale
Cheon Myeong-kwan, author
Chi-Young Kim, translator
Archipelago Books
232 Third Street #A111, Brooklyn, NY 11215
https://archipelagobooks.org
9781953861146, $22.00, PB, 327pp

https://www.amazon.com/Whale-Cheon-Myeong-Kwan/dp/1953861148

Synopsis: A woman sells her daughter to a passing beekeeper for two jars of=
honey. A baby weighing fifteen pounds is born in the depths of winter but = named "Girl of Spring." A storm brings down the roof of a ramshackle restau= rant to reveal a hidden fortune. These are just a few of the events that se=
t Cheon Myeong-kwan's beautifully crafted, wild world in motion in "Whale".

"Whale", set in a remote village in South Korea and follows the lives of ma=
ny linked characters, including Geumbok, an extremely ambitious woman who h=
as been chasing an indescribable thrill ever since she first saw a whale cr= est in the ocean; her mute daughter, Chunhui, who communicates with elephan= ts; and a one-eyed woman who controls honeybees with a whistle.

Critique: Ably translated in English by Chi-Young Kim, "Whale" by showcases=
and documents South Korean author Cheon Myeong-kwan as a natural born stor= yteller and one with a cinematic, darkly humorous, and thoroughly original = perspective. Replete with unexpected surprises and a wicked sense of humor,=
"Whale" is a riveting, rollicking, combination of adventure and satire of = epic saga proportions by arguably one of the most original literary talents=
in international literature. While an unreservedly recommended addition to=
personal, community, college, and university library International Literar=
y Fiction collections, it should be noted for students, academia, and non-s= pecialist general readers that "Whale" is also available in a digital book = format (Kindle, $8.63).

Editorial Note #1: Cheon Myeong-kwan (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheon_M= yeong-kwan) is a South Korean novelist and screenwriter. Upon publication o=
f his first story, "Frankand I" (2003), he received the prestigious Munhakd= ongne New Writer Award. His debut novel, The Whale, published the following=
year, won him the 10th Munhakdongne Novel Award. His novels have been tran= slated into Chinese, English, French, Thai, Russian, and Vietnamese.

Editorial Note #2: Chi-Young Kim (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chi-young_K= im) is a literary translator and editor based in Los Angeles. A recipient o=
f the Man Asian Literary Prize for her work on Please Look After Mom by Kyu= ng-sook Shin (2011), she has translated over a dozen books, including works=
by Ae-ran Kim, You-jeong Jeong, and Young-ha Kim, among others.

A Greek Love: A Novel of Cuba
Zoe Valdes, author
David Fry, translator
Arcade Publishing
www.arcadepub.com
c/o Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.
307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018
www.skyhorsepublishing.com
9781956763409, $24.99, HC, 144pp

https://www.amazon.com/Greek-Love-Novel-Cuba/dp/1956763406

Synopsis: A free spirit who spends time near the port of Havana, where her = friend Osiris is known as the "Greek sailormen's whore", teenager Ze become=
s pregnant after a brief love affair with a captain's son her age. By the t= ime she realizes her condition, the ship has left and the boy is gone.

In her father's Cuba, an unwed teenage mother is a source of scandal and sh= ame and a threat to his ambitions in the Party. He disowns her and brutally=
throws her out of her home. Led by her mother, she leaves the city for ref= uge in Matanzas, a university town rich in Afro-Cuban culture, where her mo= ther's sister, a music scholar, lives and where she will raise her child me= ntored by these three older women -- an aunt, a mother, and Osiris.

Years later, Ze's son, Petros, has become a world-class musician bridging C= uban and Greek traditions, while Ze has become a scholar herself. When a re= cording executive invites Petros to give concerts in Greece, Ze seeks permi= ssion from the authorities to leave the island and accompany him. Secretly =
(a secret they guard from the authorities and her father, who is now a Part=
y stalwart) they both nourish the hope of somehow finding Petros's father a=
nd Ze's one great, lost love.

Critique: A remarkable, engaging, memorable, original story of human passio= ns, emotional endurance, unrelenting hope, -- as well as one woman's resolu=
te and enduring love for the father of her child, "A Greek Love" by Cuban n= ovelist Zoe Vales is expertly translated into English for an American reade= rship by David Frye. The result is a deftly engaging read from cover to cov=
er and a novel that is especially and unreservedly recommended for both com= munity and academic Contemporary International Literary Fiction collections=
.. It should be noted that "A Greek Love" is also readily available in a dig= ital book format (Kindle, $16.99).

Editorial Note #1: Zoe Valdes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zo%C3%A9_Vald%= C3%A9s) was born in Cuba in 1959 and worked with UNESCO and the Cuban Cultu= ral Office in Paris between 1983 and 1988. In exile in France since 1995, s=
he has been a screenwriter and assistant director of the magazine Cine Cuba= no. Her bestselling debut novel, Yocandra in the Paradise of Nada, brought = her international acclaim - she was once dubbed "the Madonna of Cuban liter= ature" - and she has written many more novels, including I Gave You All I H=
ad and The Weeping Woman, both published by Arcade. Winner of the Planeta P= rize, Azorin Prize, and Premio de Novela Ciudad de Torrevieja, she received=
the Tres Llaves (Three Keys) to the city of Miami in 2001. She currently l= ives in Paris.

David Frye teaches anthropology and Latin American culture and society at t=
he University of Michigan. As a professional translator he has published mo=
re than thirty books in translation, ranging from Heart of Tango (2010) by = the Spanish novelist Elia Barcelo and the sixteenth-century picaresque nove=
l Lazarillo de Tormes (2015) to the poetry of Nancy Morejon. He resides in = Ann Arbor.

Dom Casmurro
Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, author
Margaret Jull Costa, translator
Robin Patterson, translator
Liveright
c/o W. W. Norton & Company
500 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10110
www.wwnorton.com
9781324090700, $27.95, HC, 288pp

https://www.amazon.com/Casmurro-Joaquim-Maria-Machado-Assis/dp/1324090707

Synopsis: Originally published in 1899, "Dom Casmurro" is widely considered=
to be Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis's masterpiece and a progenitor of twe= ntieth-century Latin American fiction. This exuberant new translation captu= res all the hilarious, maddening, and utterly compelling idiosyncrasies of = one of Machado's most complex characters.

Bento Santiago, our charismatic yet exceedingly unreliable narrator, nickna= med by his enemies Dom Casmurro, has become a bit of a recluse in old age. =
He spends his days reading and mourning the past in a house built as a repl= ica of his childhood home. One day, musing over the painted busts of Nero, = Augustus, Masinissa, and Caesar, he is inspired to write his own story, a t= ale of equally epic proportions. Or so, at least, he thinks.

"Yes, let us begin by evoking a famous November afternoon, one I will never=
forget," he writes, recalling the day he fell in love with his childhood s= weetheart, Capitu. Thus he transports readers back to his youth in a once f= ashionable neighborhood, when he and Capitu were neighbors playing innocent=
ly in the backyard. But after overcoming many obstacles, Bento's happy-ever= -after ending proves short-lived when he is consumed by paranoia and jealou= sy.

At once oblivious and obsessive, Bento becomes a strangely engaging antiher=
o as he mines the repercussions of his suspicions against the backdrop of a=
rapidly modernizing Rio de Janeiro.

Critique: Eloquently and collaboratively translated by Margaret Jull Costa = and Robin Patterson (the same duo that sparked a Machado renaissance with t= heir brilliant translations of The Collected Stories and Posthumous Memoirs=
of Bras Cubas) and brimming with the signature literary charm of author Jo= aquim Maria Machado de Assis, "Dom Casmurro" is a subversive and groundbrea= king dark comedy from one of Brazil's greatest authors and now readily avai= lable to an American readership. A highly recommended pick for community an=
d academic library Literary Fiction collections, it should be noted for per= sonal reading lists that "Dom Casmurro" is also available in a digital book=
format (Kindle, $14.99).

Editorial Note #1: Machado de Assis (21 June 1839 - 29 September 1908) was = born in Rio de Janeiro and, along with seven short-story collections, wrote=
such groundbreaking novels as Quincas Borba and The Alienist. (https://en.= wikipedia.org/wiki/Machado_de_Assis)

Editorial Note #2: For her translations of Spanish and Portuguese, Margaret=
Jull Costa (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Jull_Costa) has won the=
Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize four times as well as the Premio Valle= -Inclan, the International Dublin Literary Award, and the 2008 PEN Prize fo=
r best translation from any language for The Maias, by Eca de Queiros (New = Directions, 2007).

Editorial Note #3: Award-winning translator Robin Patterson lives in Englan=
d. he has participated in both the Birkbeck and the BCLT literary translati=
on summer schools and in 2013 was mentored by Margaret Jull Costa as part o=
f the BCLT mentorship program. His translation of Our Musseque by Jose Luan= dino Vieira was published by Dedalus Books. Additionally, his translations = have appeared in Ninth Letter, on the Bookanista website, and in The Footba=
ll Cronicas. (https://wordswithoutborders.org/contributors/view/robin-patte= rson)

The Country of Too
Rodrigo Rey Rosa, author
Stephen Henighan, translator
Biblioasis
www.biblioasis.com
9781771965149, $16.95, PB, 120pp

https://www.amazon.com/Country-To%C3%B3-Biblioasis-International-Translatio= n/dp/1771965142

Synopsis: Raised on his wits on the streets of Central America, the Cobra, =
a young debt collector and gang enforcer, has never had the chance to disce=
rn between right and wrong, until he's assigned the murder of Polo, a promi= nent human rights activist -- and his friend.

When his conscience gives him pause and his patron catches on, a remote May=
an community offers the Cobra a potential refuge, but the people there are =
up against predatory mining companies. With danger encroaching, the Cobra i=
s forced to confront his violent past and make a decision about what he's w= illing to risk in the future, and who it will be for.

Following the Cobra, Polo, are a faction of drug-dealing oligarchs, and Jac= obo, a child caught in the crosshairs, Rey Rosa maps an extensive web of co= rruption upheld by decades of political oppression. A scathing indictment o=
f exploitation in all its forms, "The Country of Too" offers a particularly=
gripping account of what it means to consider societal change under the co= nstant threat of violence.

Critique: Ably translated into English by Stephen Henighan, the narrative d= riven and distinctive storytelling style of novelist Rodrigo Rey Rosa raise=
s "The Country of Too" from a basic crime thriller to that of a work of lit= erary excellence making it unreservedly recommended for community, college,=
and university library Contemporary International Literary Fiction collect= ions. It should be noted for personal reading lists that "The Country of To=
o" is also readily available in a digital book format (Kindle, $9.99).

Editorial Note #1: Born and raised in Guatemala City, Rodrigo Rey Rosa is t=
he author of five collections of short stories and more than a dozen novels=
that have been published in sixteen languages. Among his works available i=
n English are The Beggar's Knife, The Pelcari Project (both translated by e= xpatriate American author Paul Bowles), The Good Cripple, The African Shore=
, Human Matter, and Chaos: A Fable. Rey Rosa has been awarded Guatemala's n= ational literature prize, China's Best Foreign Book Award, and, for his lif= e's work, the prestigious Jose Donoso Prize in Chile. (https://en.wikipedia= ..org/wiki/Rodrigo_Rey_Rosa)

Editorial Note #2: Stephen Henighan's translations have twice been longlist=
finalists for the Best Translated Book Award and once for the Internationa=
l Dublin Literary Award. He is the author of ten books of fiction, most rec= ently the short story collection Blue River and Red Earth (2018) and the no= vel The World of After (2021). (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Henig= han)

Yuwa: A Novel
Yixin Chen, author
Howard Goldblatt, translator
Long River Press
c/o China Books
https://www.chinabooks.com
9781592652587, $16.95, PB, 140pp

https://www.amazon.com/Yuwa-Novel-Yixin-Chen/dp/1592652581

Synopsis: Set in a dirt-poor area of Gansu Province in China's far west, "Y= uwa" is a contemporary novel about a boy who rises above his marginal exist= ence in a village bypassed by economic growth.

Yuwa (rain child) leads a simple life surrounded by an extended family, lov=
e, and friendship. He tends sheep with his grand-uncle, who teaches him abo=
ut life; he goes to school with his best friend, whose loyalty never wavers=
; he has an aunt who dotes on him and a mother who worries about him.

As a novel, "Yuwa" builds in intensity and emotion after the boy experience=
s heartbreak after heartbreak. While symbolizing the challenges facing the = villagers, the story illustrates how a child's indomitable nature and inher= ent decency help him endure despite the forces of nature, tradition, and cr= uelty arrayed against him.

Critique: It is difficult to read a novel like "Yuwa" without also taking n= ote of its symbolic resonance and message of hope. Chen Yixin is young Chin= ese writer who was born and grew up in a village similar to Yuwa's. Chen's = childhood experience has given him a unique perspective on contemporary lif=
e in impoverished parts of China that seldom emerge from the shadows. With = plain language and compassion. Deftly crafted by author/storyteller Yixin C= hen and very ably translated into English by Howard Goldblatt (who is the t= ranslator of numerous works of Chinese fiction, including Xiao Hong, Su Ton=
g, and Nobel Laureate Mo Yan) "Yuwa" and unreservedly recommended for perso= nal, community, college, and university library Contemporary Literary Ficti=
on collections. It should be noted that "Yuwa" was originally published in = Chinese in 2019 and is now readily available from Long River Press.

Double Vision: Stories From Home
C.T. Fitzgerald
Emerald Books
9781954779709, $8.99

https://www.amazon.com/Double-Vision-C-T-Fitzgerald/dp/1954779704

Double Vision: Stories From Home embraces the childhood and life of author = C.T. Fitzgerald, providing prose and poetry that capture his world through =
a series of candid truths about what he saw, experienced, and heard.

The stories unfold an origami of life impressions that some readers may fin=
d gritty in their language, and perhaps even politically or racially biased=
or derogatory. These images of yesteryear are replete with such representa= tions because Fitzgerald maintains that "...exposing the realities of that = world is an important learning tool because, in my opinion, much of what I = have presented along objectionable lines still exists throughout our societ=
y in this world."

From the five-word opening flash fiction piece 'For Sale: American Dreams' =
to the more detailed 'Bodies,' which explores an unnamed northern city on t=
he eastern shore of Lake Erie which explodes with racial tension in the 196= 0s, the backdrop serves as an unusual adjunct to a story about first respon= ders whose actions lead to surprising revelations and end results that depa=
rt from normal life progressions: "No mention was made in the paper of the = "fucking idiot" Firefighter who almost wasted Officer Mike Conner."

"Locked and loaded" assumes an entirely different prospect as the responder=
muses, "Would he have to face a whole family of these sneaky cocksuckers?"=
Readers might not expect humor to intersect with social and political obse= rvation, but Fitzgerald's candid vignettes open both cans of worms and hila= rity as events unfold with the precise observations of a world replete with=
police, shotguns, working-class men, the mysteries of women, and jobs on t=
he line.

More so than most memoirs or collections about community and coming of age,=
Fitzgerald's stories in Double Vision reinforce a sense of time and place = that will seem both alien and oddly familiar to his readers. His attention =
to building the dialogues and interpersonal interactions that come from ass= umptions about the world and minorities as well as white privilege makes fo=
r a collection that is as constantly hard-hitting as trench warfare, and as=
socially thought-provoking as any history of the times.

Double Vision: Stories From Home would do especially well as a book club se= lection, powering its insights with controversial subjects that will lend t=
o debate and social inspection among a wide circle of readers. Libraries th=
at choose Double Vision: Stories From Home for their literary collections w= ill find it will appeal to readers of memoirs as well as literature student=
s interested in vignettes that circle around what can and cannot be changed=
in the community, world, and self.

EDITOR'S NOTE:

The Midwest Book Review is an organization of volunteers committed to promo= ting literacy, library usage, and small press publishing. We accept no fund=
s from authors or publishers. Full permission is given to post any of these=
reviews on thematically appropriate websites, newsgroups, listserves, inte= rnet discussion groups, organizational newsletters, or to interested indivi= duals. Please give the Midwest Book Review a credit line when doing so.

The Midwest Book Review publishes the monthly book review magazines "Califo= rnia Bookwatch", "Internet Bookwatch", "Children's Bookwatch", "MBR Bookwat= ch", "Reviewer's Bookwatch", and "Small Press Bookwatch". All are available=
for free on the Midwest Book Review website at www (dot) midwestbookreview=
(dot) com

Anyone wanting to submit books for review consideration can send them to:

James A. Cox, Editor-in-Chief
Midwest Book Review
278 Orchard Drive
Oregon, WI 53575-1129

To submit reviews of any fiction or non-fiction books, email them to Frugal= muse (at) aol (dot) com (Be sure to include the book title, author, publish= er, publisher address, publisher website/phone number, 13-digit ISBN number=
, and list price).

James A. Cox, Editor-in-Chief
Midwest Book Review

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