28 Jun / Self-Portrait with Ghost by Meng Jin [in Booklist]
*STARRED REVIEW
Following her extraordinary novel Little Gods (2020), Meng Jin presents a fascinating 10-story collection divided into four sections. One-line drawings of profiles interrupt, switching directions as if cleverly reminding readers to shift perspectives.
Death haunts the first three titles. In “Philip Is Dead,” the narrator insistently does not mourn a manipulative ex-lover. In “Suffering,” a widow can’t trust her dead husband, her pretentious sister, or “old and ugly” Mr. Fu, who wants to take care of her. In “Self Portrait with Ghost,” a paternal aunt who was “crazy” in life posthumously returns to talk books outside a library with her writer niece.
The unforgettable, living or not, appear in “First Love,” about a caregiver who pays more attention to her amorous obsession than her young charge, and in “With Feeling Heart,” in which a hungry old man haunts across geographies and time. “Selena and Ruthie” traverses the intimacies and partings of a best friendship that begins in middle school. All manner of planning can’t account for every precaution in “In the Event.” Luminaries Vandana Singh, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Octavia Butler inspire the superpowered protagonists in “The Odd Women.”
Jin effortlessly navigates across generations, cultures, and borders to expose inequities, misunderstandings, and “this America … in these ‘unprecedented times.’” The result proves deftly imaginative and brilliantly interrogative.
Review: “Fiction,” Booklist, June 1, 2022
Readers: Adult
Published: 2022