Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie

A 50BookChallenge recommendation, I signed up for a Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress Bookcrossing bookcircle a month or two ago & received it in the mail earlier this week.

This novel is simply-told story about two young men, sent to the Chinese countryside for "reeducation" during the Cultural Revolution. They work long hard hours, but still make time to savor the culture of their former bourgeois life: the main narrator plays his violin and Luo, his friend, retells stories from movies and novels to the spellbound villagers.

They discover a cache of forbidden books, including works by Balzac; Luo uses these to help educate (and seduce) the Little Seamstress of the title. The main narrator finds himself attracted to her as well, though he honors his friendship with Luo.

I read this book in the middle of a bustling, noisy outdoor festival and, despite the band playing halfway down the block from me, I rarely got distracted. The storytelling in this novel seems both down-to-earth and legend-like. At times, the anger, fear and despair these young men must have felt gets glossed over in favor of the romantic, not only the Little Seamstress, but the mythic status of the Miller and the Tailor as well.

Recommended to anyone looking for a short escape into another world, where both despair and triumph have their place.

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What I've read so far this year ~~ My Bibliophil.org Library ~~ Mount ToBeRead