Wrong Train, Right Time (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
wrongtrainrighttime) wrote2018-11-17 11:01 pm
wrongtrainrighttime) wrote2018-11-17 11:01 pm
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"The Terracotta Bride" by Zen Cho
I knew of Zen Cho from reading some of her previous short fiction (most notably "The House of Aunts") via buzz around her novel Sorcerer to the Crown. The novel itself didn’t sound like my thing, but I was interested enough to pick up this novella, which kept floating around my algorithmically generated recommendations with a very intriguing cover.
It was a good choice: I enjoyed this novella very much. I liked the little undercurrent of tension between Siew Tsin being stuck in Chinese hell versus her very Western, Christian, education. Siew Tsin was an interesting choice of protagonist, quiet and sad, resigned to her circumstances. Her frustration leaks out around the edges of the apathy she has pulled around herself, like a snail withdraws into a shell. The arrival of Yonghua, the titular terracotta bride, upsets everything, but not in the way I expected.
In the end, it’s not Siew Tsin who gets to make the spectacular escape, who gets to run away with a love into the next life. But she is the one who gets to be inspired by that. Who, having lived around the edges of Yonghua’s story, follows in Yonghua's wake, and winds up concluding her own story. And I think that's an interesting choice, to write from the perspective of the one who is inspired, rather than the inspiring one. But it works wonderfully.
Still not sure that Sorcerer to the Crown is my cup of tea, but I'd like to read more of Zen Cho's short fiction.
It was a good choice: I enjoyed this novella very much. I liked the little undercurrent of tension between Siew Tsin being stuck in Chinese hell versus her very Western, Christian, education. Siew Tsin was an interesting choice of protagonist, quiet and sad, resigned to her circumstances. Her frustration leaks out around the edges of the apathy she has pulled around herself, like a snail withdraws into a shell. The arrival of Yonghua, the titular terracotta bride, upsets everything, but not in the way I expected.
In the end, it’s not Siew Tsin who gets to make the spectacular escape, who gets to run away with a love into the next life. But she is the one who gets to be inspired by that. Who, having lived around the edges of Yonghua’s story, follows in Yonghua's wake, and winds up concluding her own story. And I think that's an interesting choice, to write from the perspective of the one who is inspired, rather than the inspiring one. But it works wonderfully.
Still not sure that Sorcerer to the Crown is my cup of tea, but I'd like to read more of Zen Cho's short fiction.