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loriluo 's review for:
The House of Doors
by Tan Twan Eng
Told across alternating time periods in 20th century Penang, "The House of Doors" looks into what appears to be an banal couple, Robert and Leslie Hamlyn, who live in the Straits Settlements. Robert is an esteemed barrister who met his wife in the UK before the two moved to Malaysia, but it's Lesley who the bulk of the novel focuses on. At first glance, she appears to be a stern housewife-turned-socialite, but it's only after the arrival of her husband's friend, author Willie Somerset Maugham, in 1921 that we begin to learn more about her. It's thanks to Willie's interest in her past and her history with Sun Yat Sen, the leader of China's Kuomintang, that she reveals more about herself and the events that unraveled a decade earlier.
I really wanted to love this novel as there's some fascinating aspects of it I had yet to encounter before. The setting and time period is unusual, and it was an eye-opening look to what life was like in southeast Asia during the early 1900's, especially given the number of foreigners that moved into countries like Malaysia the impact these populations had on society as whole. While I was familiar with some of the events and political situations going on in China at the time, it was fascinating to see how those impacted the neighboring countries and citizens. This is my first encounter with Tan Twan Eng's works as well, and I found him to be a masterful writer - the prose is descriptive and well-structured, and this is the only time I've encountered "tintinnabulation" used within a novel.
However, I struggled with this novel as a whole given how slow the pacing was, even as someone who generally prefers character-driven novels over plot-driven ones. While I found some of these characters to be intriguing, such as Lesley and Willie, there is a a lot of build up needed to start unraveling their complexities and histories and while some of the topics brought up were intriguing (i.e. homosexuality in 20th century Asia), there wasn't much done with them. While this isn't personally a novel I'd recommend, I'd still love to explore more works by this author.
Thank you Canongate Publishing for the advance copy of this novel!
I really wanted to love this novel as there's some fascinating aspects of it I had yet to encounter before. The setting and time period is unusual, and it was an eye-opening look to what life was like in southeast Asia during the early 1900's, especially given the number of foreigners that moved into countries like Malaysia the impact these populations had on society as whole. While I was familiar with some of the events and political situations going on in China at the time, it was fascinating to see how those impacted the neighboring countries and citizens. This is my first encounter with Tan Twan Eng's works as well, and I found him to be a masterful writer - the prose is descriptive and well-structured, and this is the only time I've encountered "tintinnabulation" used within a novel.
However, I struggled with this novel as a whole given how slow the pacing was, even as someone who generally prefers character-driven novels over plot-driven ones. While I found some of these characters to be intriguing, such as Lesley and Willie, there is a a lot of build up needed to start unraveling their complexities and histories and while some of the topics brought up were intriguing (i.e. homosexuality in 20th century Asia), there wasn't much done with them. While this isn't personally a novel I'd recommend, I'd still love to explore more works by this author.
Thank you Canongate Publishing for the advance copy of this novel!