Tash Aw has written a beautifully observed coming-of-age novel so desultory that I almost didn't get that he had accomplished something I've always said I longed for until its final, bittersweet pages: depicting a kid's homosexuality--or ethnicity, for that matter--as something that marks him no more dramatically than his eye color.
That may sound odd for a book, an incisive exploration of family dynamics in a changing world, that opens with a bang: Jay, a teenager, is anally penetrated by Chuan, a working class guy who turns out to be his slightly older "distant" cousin against a type of tree that has a different set of romantic associations for an earlier generation. The deflowering occurs in semi-rural Malaysia, shortly before the end of the 20th century when urbanization had begun its steady, encroaching crawl. Sui, Jay's mother, has inherited a mostly unproductive farm from her father-in-law, a man whose impoverished, illegitimate son, Fong, works the land with Chuan. Sui and Jack, a failing, much older math professor, visit the farm for the summer with their children who also include Jay's two older sisters, confrontational Lina and peacemaker Yin, before deciding what to do with it.
As the novel progresses, each of these characters gets his or her due as a series of flashbacks unfold, some from the perspective of Jay reflecting on his evolving relationship with Chuan, now nothing more than a distant, if pivotal memory proving that the first cut really is the deepest. Their metaphor-filled journey--Aw's novel was long-listed for the Booker Prize, after all--is way more important than the destination, and it realistically reflects the tensions between the country and city mice, as well as adolescent angst and adult repression among the haves and have-nots.
I won't soon forget one of Aw's final images which perfectly captures the quotidian lives of his characters:
In the dazzling, eerie cloud of fireflies, tiny dots of light fade out and Jay wonders whether they are extinguished by death or something less definitive, fatigue or migration. He worries that they will all start to go out, signifying the end of a season – of many tiny lives. As if sensing Jay’s concern, Chuan says, Isn’t it incredible, this lasts all night.
The South proves both characters right as their brief summer of ordinary, unremarkable love continues to animate Jay's adult perspective.
