Review The Rice Mother Constructed By Rani Manicka Format Printed Matter
is nothing new about a storyline that takes a woman with no education, no experience in the world who winds up either a widow or with a wastrel husband, a brood and no means of support for her family.
It's been done by male and female writers, it's been played out in every possible kind of setting and time period from ancient Roman households to Mayberry.
So as an author if you're going to take that crumbly old plot and make it the center of your novel you had better be able to pony up some good writing to make it palatable.
In the novel,The Rice Mother, author Rani Manicka does just that,
Lakshmi is the Mother in this multigenerational story, In the early's she is married off and leaves her native Ceylon with her husband, Ayah, for Maylasia, Once in Maylaysia Lakshmi learns that heryear old husband had borrowed a gold watch and a servant in order to convince her Mother that he was rich and marry her.
In reality he's a clerk who lives a hand to mouth existence, However what's done is done, She is now a fourteen year old wife, housekeeper and stepmother, It isn't long before it's clear to Lakshmi that although Ayah is basically a good man and loves her that he is incapable of supporting them.
By the time she turns nineteen, Lakshmi has in quick succession given birth to six children, It is only her sheer force of will that keeps her family together, For the family the worst is yet to come with WWII and the occupation by the Japanese, It is a brutal and faith testing time that leaves them scarred forever,
Although larger than life as all matriarchs are in these kinds of novels, Lashmi is a believably flawed person, Her evolution from happy teenager daydreaming about her future to an embittered, hard, angry, able to make the tough decisions that may cost her children's love woman is honestly depicted through her experiences and circumstances.
Author Manicka moves the novel forward through Lakshmi, her children and her grandchildren with mutilate family members living and deceased taking their turn telling the story.
The characters limited choices, weaknesses and their temptations are successfully detailed against fifty years of Malaysian history,
The Rice Mother is a big novel with some first time novelist missteps, The book is a little too cluttered with sometimes too convenient plot twists and one or two of the characters are cartoonish in their evilness.
That said it is also a well written, interesting dissection of a world and a time that most of us know little about, Manicka's obvious knowledge of and affection for the culture and beauty of Maylasia is evident throughout the book, The Rice Mother is a journey into a family whose difficult lives and small victories enrich the rest of us,
Интересна градация имаше във възприемането ми на книгата. В началото не ми хареса, подразних се от сходството с другата книга на авторката Японският любовник, но постепенно различната й сила се появи. Допадна ми, че майката разказва от свое име, а после децата й и други герои също разказват от първо лице. Имаше динамика и свързаност и същевременно интересно представяне на едни и същи неща от различни гледни точки чрез различните разказвачи.
Към средата вече чувствата и събитията станаха доста интензивни“. Героите, макар и деца на една майка, бяха толкова различни и реални. Но в последнитестр. интересът ми спадна рязко героите се поизгубиха, пропуснаха се периоди от време Когато започнаха да се появяват основно герои от трето поколение че и четвърто, не усещах същата близост с героите като в средата на романа.
Книгата ми зададе“ следните въпроси защо така се получава, въпреки огромните усилия на една майка и пълната отдаденост и желание за успех и щастие
на децата огледах героите и видях щастлива и с хубаво семейство само една от дъщерите, обясних си го с това, че единствено тя беше получила умерено внимание и грижа нито беше любимото дете, което беше погубено от свръхлюбовта на майката, нито беше пренебрегвана и неоценена като някои от другите деца
Видях и лесното прокрадване на яростната омраза, която се настанява трайно и последствията й не изчезват с поколения Въпреки идеята за пътя напред в самия край но наистина всичко ми беше размито“ в последните части, остава тежкото чувство за много изгубено. Не мога да отрека обаче, че с отдалечаването от войната/окупацията имаше известно изчистване”. Дори се зачудих трябва ли да има такива тежки събития, че да е приковано вниманието на читателя или авторката наистина не е успяла да доразвие нещата докрай/или аз не видях нещо
Като цяло силен образ на майкатаорлица” Найинтересно в тази книга ми беше явлението семейство“. В онези години и места направо си е било "мисия" за една жена жена ли или млада неука девойка, принудително тръгнала от едно затънтено място към непознатата джунгла на живота, неподготвена но смело скочила и поела нещата, вероятно вярвала, че рави найдоброто
O carte emoționantă țesută minuțios,magic și complex în jurul Lakshamei ,zeiței orezului ,o femeie puternică care prin personalitatea și deciziile sale influentează viețile celor din jurul său ,cu implicații adânci în destinul copiilor săi și în generațiile următoare.
Romanul este construit deosebit prin povestea plină de sentimente,trăiri,frustrări a fiecărui membru din familia Zeiței ,cu referiri la relațiile familiale ,la realitățile sociale din Malaysia secolului XX împletite cu credințe și ritualuri magice.
O carte foarte frumoasa !
"Fiecare familie e nefericită în felul ei, "
The Rice Mother starts with the story of Lakshmi, a young, carefree Sri Lankan girl whose world is turned upside down when, at fourteen, she is married off to a much older man from Malaysia under the pretext of riches and luxury.
Duped but refusing to cower down, Lakshmi faces her struggles bravely, and has six children by the time she's turned, Lakshmi's struggles to keep her house running, and her family functioning are commendable, and just when things are beginning to go uphill, the Japanese invade Malaysia during World War II.
Overnight, her world changes, as young girls turn into boys, and Lakshmi has to hide her oldest daughter who is described to be as beautiful as the celestial Apsara Menaka from the Japanese soldiers.
Midway during the book, an event during this war changes the family, beyond the point of no return, We watch the six children grow up each have their own chapters as narrators to be drunk gamblers, idlers, or good for nothing miserable wretches.
Lakshmi becomes cruel with every passing day, and regularly turns her children's lives to hell, all in the name of protecting them,
The problem lies with the second half, when the children and their wives and their kids all get their own POVs, making the read a tedious one, as there isn't enough depth or focus to actually care about them.
What starts off as a notable journey of a woman's resilience to extreme conditions soon turns into a mess with the litany of characters thrown in, all of whom are firstrate losers.
After a point, the prose, overwrought with sentimentality, fails to evoke sympathy, and I was left wishing for it to end soon,
The book has its shining moments, of course Lakshmi's husband, although dumb and weak, is shown to be a wonderful man, who the children turn to when their mother becomes a force of terror.
His experience with the war is one of the highlights of the book, but fails to save the work as a whole, There is redemption at the end, not for Lakshmi and her brood, but for the great granddaughter, who finally discovers, and accepts the tragic legacy of her ancestors, to redeem herself from the sorrows in her own life.
All in all,stars, because it isn't a bad book by any standard, but in my opinion, rather forgettable,
Some quotes I loved:
“I was born in Ceylon inat a time when spirits walked the earth just like people, before the glare of electricity and the roar of civilization had frightened them away into the concealed hearts of the forests.
”
“Life had yet to teach me that a childs love can never equal a mothers pain, ”
“I have been weak and pathetic because I forgot that love comes and goes like the dye that colours a garment, I mistook love for the garment, Family is the garment. Let her wear her family with pride, ”
This book was up and down for me almost the entire time, sometimes within the same page, I think it could have used a better editor, perhaps, to hone in on the heart of the story and trim off the distractions flapping 'round the edges.
My main problem, which might not be entirely fair, is that this read like a poor rendition of The Poisonwood Bible, in terms of theme and the devices used to tell the story.
It was a multiple narrator novel, with the narrator's name as the chapter title, The trouble, as I noted when I was halfway through, is that, in the absence of the titles, I would have been hard pressed to distinguish the characters from one another.
This is perhaps where some editing would have been useful I think it was hard to meaningfully flesh out unique characterizations and voices with so many narrators tromping through the story.
One major issue I have with the characterization spoiler alert is the way the matriarch, the Rice Mother, Lakshmi, was portrayed as a wild and carefree spoiled child who roamed free until she was.
At that point she was promptly taken into the home and turned into a woman, and soon, a child bride, The rest of the novel is an ode to her iron will, her impeccable cooking/cleaning/organization, and the way she fought tooth and nail for her children.
What I kept wondering was how such a woman sprang from the spoiled only child from the first few pages It never made sense to me that Lakshmi would be a steely, determined, disciplined, focused woman.
Where did she learn this It seems like a minor quibble, but really, the entire novel and the title is based on the power of the matriarch, so it seemed strange the author would not have given more thought to how her childhood and upbringing were presented in order to be consistent.
The prose was often lovely, the setting was interesting, and there were moments of real beauty here and there, I also found bits of it awkward and strangely out of place, I suppose this just goes back to my first reaction, that it was up and down the entire time, The inconsistency made it hard for me to hit a groove, and thus I found myself strangely unmoved by the major tragedy that altered the family forever.
It was sad, but it seemed so calculated, and so obvious, that I knew what was going to happen before it ever happened the foreshadowing was quite heavy handed and when it did happen it felt inevitable instead of shocking or surprising.
The story line I was most drawn to was the uncle's Sevenese, From his childhood spent with the snake charmer's boy to the debauchery of his nomadic, bachelor ways, I found him the most interesting, I would have gladly sacrificed one or two of the more clunky narrators to hear more from him, I could not believe that this one is a debut novel, This author has quite a promising career, The book gripped me from the beginning and never let go,
The family saga spanning aboutyears in time beginning in thes is told from the perspective of many different family members spanning four generations.
I loved that way of telling the story of this family set in Malaysia dealing with all of their adversities and they had many including the Japanese occupation during WWII.
But later it is revealed that there is a definite reason for telling the story in this manner, And that is only one of the many surprises, Toward the end of the book there is a gap in the story which at first annoyed me and then the reason was revealed which brings the entire book together into one cohesive story.
It was so compelling and riveting that it was hard to put down especially as you neared the ending,
From Lakshmi the Rice Mother who in her own tragic way does her utmost to shape her family into the picture of success and prosperity to Nisha, the great granddaughter who works to reestablish her family ties, this story is filled with drama, passion, sorrow, tragedy and triumph.
A great one that I would highly recommend,
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