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arielzeit 's review for:
The Ghost Bride
by Yangsze Choo
This is the first novel by the author of "Night Tiger," which got a lot of attention last year, and in some ways I like it even better. Yangsze Choo is from an ethnic Chinese family from Malaysia, educated in the U.K. and living in the U.S., and she spins original fantastical, readable, beautiful novels with roots in her culture's folklore. This is apparently being made into a series in Mandarin; I'll have to track it down and view it.
I'm not sure why anyone would call this a teen novel though the heroine-narrator is a young Chinese-Malay girl who is betrothed to a wealthy dead man against her will. She comes from a once-wealthy family that is down on its luck but retains prestige, which is why her father is willing to consider the match. Meanwhile, she longs for the dead man's handsome live cousin. She leaves her body and travels through the spirit world trying to find a way out of the marriage, trying to understand the effects of the world of the dead on the world of the living, and to unravel the complicated murders that have led to her current situation. Along the way she seeks to meet the spirit of her long-dead mother and finds surprising allies who lead her to a surprising choice. I just loved this novel!
I'm not sure why anyone would call this a teen novel though the heroine-narrator is a young Chinese-Malay girl who is betrothed to a wealthy dead man against her will. She comes from a once-wealthy family that is down on its luck but retains prestige, which is why her father is willing to consider the match. Meanwhile, she longs for the dead man's handsome live cousin. She leaves her body and travels through the spirit world trying to find a way out of the marriage, trying to understand the effects of the world of the dead on the world of the living, and to unravel the complicated murders that have led to her current situation. Along the way she seeks to meet the spirit of her long-dead mother and finds surprising allies who lead her to a surprising choice. I just loved this novel!