Reviews

The Laughter by Sonora Jha is literary fiction that plays with the genre and storytelling in thought provoking ways. I picked this up on the suggestion of friends I trust, and I don't think I would have been drawn to it otherwise. Told from the point of view of Oliver Harding, a white 56 year old English professor, this is an extreme example of an unlikable narrator. In fact for the first sixty pages, I questioned if I could spend 300 pages with Professor Harding.

Fortunately, I stuck with it because this book is brilliant. By keeping a single point of view, that of Oliver Harding, we gather what he wants to share about Ruhaba Khan, the Pakistani female professor that he fetishizes, and her nephew that has been sent to live with her from France. The boy has been sent by his parents to escape some unnamed problems back home.

As Oliver tries to get closer to Ruhaba, simultaneously protests begin on their college campus as students demand more diverse representation on staff and in the curriculum. Everything builds to a very surprising crescendo and ends with just the kind of haunting ending that I love.

If you can handle numerous references to the 2016 election and a very unlikeable narrator's inner monologue, I think this book has a lot to offer.

pagesofpins's review against another edition

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Ugh, this guy.

heatherburgin's review

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dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Weird story, weirder way to tell it. There were a lot of uncomfortable themes to take in and at the same time, it moved so slowly that you really had to suffer. finished as quickly as possible so the narrator would stop talking.