11 Apr / The Secret Talker by Geling Yan, translated by Jeremy Tiang [in Booklist]
Conflate “secret” and “talker” and you’ll land on “stalker” – which is what “this stranger on the internet” proves to be in author and screenwriter Geling Yan’s latest Anglophoned novel, English-enabled by award-winning Singaporean writer and translator Jeremy Tiang. Originally published in Chinese in 2004 means well before the ubiquity of all-revealing social media, leaving the would-be stalker and (not-quite) victim to communicate via email.
After dinner out with her husband, Qiao Hongmei receives an anonymous missive revealing that the sender has “evidently… taken note of her every move and gesture.” She’s more flattered than alarmed, noting “his tone was a little presumptuous, but she liked his writing style, almost like a blend of Neil Gaiman and Emily Brontë.” Their exchange continues: encouraged by the secret talker’s own confessions, Hongmei readily divulges intimacies, from betraying her current husband with her former spouse, her abortions, her growing malaise.
Only the stranger’s observations seem to penetrate Hongmei’s tiresome self-absorption to guide her toward some semblance of self-awareness. Alas, this tale is unnecessarily coy for being rather obvious, and, sadly, tedious.
Review: “Fiction,” Booklist Online, March 30, 2021
Readers: Adult
Published: 2004 (China), 2021 (United States)