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A review by slichto3
Salt Fish Girl by Larissa Lai
Eek... I really should have written this review closer to when I finished the book.... four months ago...
Well, on the whole, I like this book. And I very much liked the feeling of reading the book, which was an interesting and unique experience. I remember when I was in college and meeting lots of new people, I noticed that each person I met gave me a different feeling as well. Like of course these people were different people with different thoughts and everything, but I had this underlying quality of feeling associated with each individual person, and it felt really good! This book reminded me of that in a very refreshing way.
The book is a two-tracked story about two characters: one is a timeless character whose name I can't really remember. If you trust everything that the book says, she is some sort of marine person there at the creation of human beings. Eventually, through some magical process, she becomes a human being and starts a life in China at some point before now (I wasn't exactly clear on the timing of everything). She falls in love with a girl who smells like salt fish, but salt fish's father isn't approving, so she hatches a plot for them to get away (but doesn't exactly check this with the salt fish girl beforehand...). What follows is a wild fairy tale with shifting relationships through some weird but fascinating places.
Our other character is living in the future in I think Canada? She's struggling because she has some condition where she smells like durian fruit (which apparently smells like cat pee, so this is not very flattering). Weirdly, her conception involved something with durian as well... At the same time, there are other people in her community with similar smells associated with them - these people are looked down upon.
Eventually, these stories sort of link up. It all operates with a strange sort of dream logic where surprising things end up being true and then committed to. A weird story, and I'm not really sure of what it all means (beyond the dangers of bioengineering and greed - it gets to that at some point), but I liked it. I liked the dream like feeling/logic, and the unique way this book made me feel. I would recommend - but be ready for an odd ride!
Well, on the whole, I like this book. And I very much liked the feeling of reading the book, which was an interesting and unique experience. I remember when I was in college and meeting lots of new people, I noticed that each person I met gave me a different feeling as well. Like of course these people were different people with different thoughts and everything, but I had this underlying quality of feeling associated with each individual person, and it felt really good! This book reminded me of that in a very refreshing way.
The book is a two-tracked story about two characters: one is a timeless character whose name I can't really remember. If you trust everything that the book says, she is some sort of marine person there at the creation of human beings. Eventually, through some magical process, she becomes a human being and starts a life in China at some point before now (I wasn't exactly clear on the timing of everything). She falls in love with a girl who smells like salt fish, but salt fish's father isn't approving, so she hatches a plot for them to get away (but doesn't exactly check this with the salt fish girl beforehand...). What follows is a wild fairy tale with shifting relationships through some weird but fascinating places.
Our other character is living in the future in I think Canada? She's struggling because she has some condition where she smells like durian fruit (which apparently smells like cat pee, so this is not very flattering). Weirdly, her conception involved something with durian as well... At the same time, there are other people in her community with similar smells associated with them - these people are looked down upon.
Eventually, these stories sort of link up. It all operates with a strange sort of dream logic where surprising things end up being true and then committed to. A weird story, and I'm not really sure of what it all means (beyond the dangers of bioengineering and greed - it gets to that at some point), but I liked it. I liked the dream like feeling/logic, and the unique way this book made me feel. I would recommend - but be ready for an odd ride!