I loved, loved, loved this book of wonderful dark yet uplifting, spiritual and emotional, thought provoking short stories.  I loved the depth of each story, like a challenge, making me think what lesson I had learnt from each, I couldn't wait to read more to find out what the next story would be about.

Part fiction, part memoir, each powerful story wraps itself around Indian culture, traditions and the love of art, with unforgettable characters, this was a truly fascinating and enjoyable read.   My favorites if I have to pick had to be The Blackened Mirror, which really gripped me, next was the powerful, emotive story of love, loss and hope in A Precious Gift with every word seeming to pull at my heartstrings and finally Gauri's Freedom which had me hooked too. One story that really stood out was The Secret Healer, this had my emotions all over the place, such a sad story, which suddenly went off in a completely different, unexpected and painful direction and then ends up filling your heart with joy.

I found myself nodding in agreement, smiling, gasping as I read these short stories.  Such wonderful writing by this author, they were like a cleansing of the soul, triggering your mind to think more about each one, or reminding yourself that love changes everything, seeing the true beauty of life, opening your heart and mind and don't be judgemental in life and how easy it can be to stretch the hand of friendship that can change somebody's life.

I also enjoyed reading, at the beginning of the book, about the author's fascinating life , her passion for art and how she was chastised in life for wasting her time on her love of it, the sadness in her life which helped create the some of the stories and especially about her involvement in Vipassana meditation.  At the end of the book you are also treated to a chapter of the author's novel, An Immigrant Wife, which again really caught my interest.

This was definitely a book I will read again and probably again!

The Story of Lee focuses on Lee's relationship with her family, her love of British music, her desire to go to London, and her attraction to Matt, a handsome foreign man.

Lee is in her early twenties and lives in Hong Kong. On the one hand, she is told she must show her father respect and keep in mind his wishes for her. On the other hand, Lee feels like her father's wishes for her are stifling her. She doesn't know what to do, but she's not happy with the way things currently are.

Lee's father couldn't be more obvious about his desire for Lee to marry Wang. There isn't anything wrong with Wang – he makes decent money and seems to like her – but Lee isn't at all interested in him. She goes on one date with him because her father basically forces her to, but she makes it clear that there will be no kissing or anything else. And all thoughts of Wang fly completely out of her head when she meets Matt.

Matt is handsome, blond, and British (Scottish?), and he writes poetry. Once Lee and Matt find an opportunity to talk, they realize they get along pretty well. They talk about British music, poetry, and more. It was nice to see Lee fully relax around someone and have a frank, open, and easy conversation with them. At first, I liked Lee and Matt's relationship.

In the end, though, I think I would have liked this graphic novel more if it had completed left out the relationship with Matt and focused more on Lee's relationship with her family and her wishes for her own future. The scenes involving Lee and her family were the strongest. It was sweet, watching her read to her sick grandmother, or seeing her talking to her uncle. It was easy to see that she loved them all, even her father, with whom she butted heads the most.

My worries about Matt first began when Matt and Lee were talking about British men and women versus Asian men and women. Lee said she preferred British men “because they are kind and caring. Not because of the way they looking” (70). Matt flat out admits that he prefers the way Chinese and Japanese women look to the way Western women look. However: “The ladies round here [in Hong Kong] are very attractive... But many of them don't seem to have much to say” (67). I let that go, because Matt truly did seem to like Lee for the whole package, her looks as well as her strong personality.

I was much less happy when, later on, Matt invited Lee over to his place to watch a movie. He assured her he wouldn't pressure her for sex, which I was fine with and even applauded. However, as they were watching the movie, Matt started kissing Lee and worked his way up to fondling her breast. She protested and was clearly uncomfortable. Here's the conversation they had next:

Matt: “What's wrong?”
Lee, embarrassed/uncomfortable: “...You said, 'no sex.'”
Matt: "It's only touching."
Lee: “What's the difference?”
Matt: “Sex and touching is different...”
Lee: “For me is not. It's not my culture to do such quick things...too soon.”
Matt: “Well, it's okay in British culture... And I think it's healthy for a man and a woman to touch.”
Lee, still looking uncomfortable: “This isn't Britain, we don't...”
Matt, smiling and moving closer to touch her chin: “I thought you wanted to be more 'international,' learn about other cultures. Well this is one example, right now.” (96)

He repeatedly made her uncomfortable and embarrassed, and, instead of respecting her desire to take things more slowly, pulled out the “I thought you wanted to be more 'international'” card. Um, excuse me? No. I was very, very happy when Lee once again put a stop to things and left, but it didn't erase the fact that Matt had just tried to talk her into accepting things she was clearly uncomfortable with doing and then never apologized.

The happy ending was too sudden and left me wishing that the resolution with Lee's family had been fleshed out more. Since I was already unhappy with Lee's relationship with Matt, my unhappiness grew when the ending became thoroughly linked with Matt. As far as I can tell, a second volume of this series was never published, but I could too easily imagine that second volume featuring Matt leaving Lee behind for his friends and/or another woman after he was back on his home ground in Edinburgh.

All in all, the artwork was nice, and I enjoyed seeing how Lee would work things out with her family. Unfortunately, the romance did not work for me at all, to the point that it tainted the "happy ending."

(Original review, with read-alikes, posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

Just based on the number of times I've seen it recommended, I think this might be Somerville's best-loved book. I've owned it for a while and decided I was finally in the mood to read it.

When I start reading e-books, I usually dive right in without bothering to check their descriptions or genres. I thought at first that this was m/m fantasy romance. Sixty pages in, I decided I needed to reset my expectations, because Kei and Arman hadn't even met yet. Plus, the book's earliest (and, for the next several hundred pages, only) sex scenes involved Kei and Arman with other people. Now that I've read the whole thing, I think it might best be called fantasy (epic fantasy?) with strong m/m romantic aspects.

Arman is a general in the Prijian Empire, ordered to begin the invasion of northern Darshian – the Prij have already conquered southern Darshian. Kei is a healer in the small village of Ai-Albon, in northern Darshian. Both men view each others' peoples as savages. To Kei, the Prij are greedy, war-like, and stupidly superstitious. To Arman, the Darshianese are simple, weak, and inferior. With time, they might even be grateful to their Prijian invaders, once they learn how superior the Prijian Empire is.

When Kei is made one of the Darshianese hostages and assigned to be a slave in Arman's household, the two men gradually learn more about each other and even become friends. However, they're still on opposite sides of a war, and their friendship is a fragile and complicated thing. Kei's people have good cause to hate Arman's, and Arman's people have the power of life and death over the Darshianese hostages.

I am the kind of person who stresses out over the lives of characters I care about. This book stressed me out so much, and there were times when I had to take a break because I was afraid to see how things were going to turn out. For readers who are like me, here's a bit of reassurance: yes, the ending is a happy one.

Although I called this fantasy fiction, the fantasy aspects are very light. The Prijian Empire and Darshian both have what appears to be a fairly high percentage of infertile people, so both societies are very concerned with fertility and successful births. Among the Darshianese, some of these “infertiles” have gifts, like being able to move things with their minds or speak telepathically. The Prij view tales of Darshianese gifts as fantastic stories. At least in this book, no Prijian infertiles are gifted.

This is a very long, slow-paced book, and it takes a while for events to move forward. Sometimes I noticed the length and felt vaguely like certain parts of the story could have been condensed, and sometimes I sank into the story and barely noticed how long it was. I was a little impatient with how long it took for Arman and Kei to finally meet, but I appreciated their slow-building relationship. At the time Kei was forced to be a part of Arman's household, Arman was filled with grief and hatred. Their friendship and the eventual hints of attraction they felt for each other were complicated by their respective positions. It was wonderful, intense, emotional stuff. I'm a fan of slow-developing relationships and romance, and this book gave me that in spades.

There were times when the story went outside my comfort zone. For example, the relationship between Kei, Reji, and Arman bothered me for a while. When reading romance, I prefer it when the characters are emotionally and physically involved with one person. After Kei and Arman became a couple, I wasn't sure how things were going to go. Early on, some of Reji's comments made me think that he was perhaps more content to have a long-term relationship with Kei than Kei realized, and I dreaded the “break up” scene.

It went better than I expected, but it bothered me that Kei viewed Reji as the lover he no longer had sex with and Arman as the lover he did. I saw it as unfair to both Reji and Arman, although they mostly seemed fine with that setup. I wanted Reji to be able to move on, and I wanted Arman to know he had a lover who cared for him and would never leave him for someone else. After the years Arman spent married to Mayl, I felt he needed that. All of this was dealt with in a way that worked better for me by the end, but, like everything else, it took a while.

Lots of things went more smoothly than I would have expected. This is not exactly a complaint, but I did spend a good portion of the book expecting horrible things that never happened. I tensed up before Kei's “break up” with Reji, before the trial at Ai-Darbin, and all throughout the events at the end. I won't say that everything was resolved easily, but it did all go much more smoothly than I expected, which left me feeling kind of...disappointed? Which is weird, because it's not like I wanted the characters to suffer more.

Probably my biggest complaint about this book was how black-and-white some things were. The Prijian Empire was warlike, superstitious, and arrogant. I struggle to think of a single good to say about it. Kei, a hostage and slave, had no reason to like it, and even Arman didn't seem to like anything about his home country besides Loke, his friend and servant, and Karus, his teacher. Darshian, meanwhile, was positively presented. It wasn't 100% perfect, but it was definitely better than the Prijian Empire, to the point that several Prij wanted to move there by the end.

I had similar issues with the way Mayl was depicted. At first, I thought she might end up being a more nuanced character. I thought her and Arman's marriage had started off well and then soured, but later it was confirmed that Arman had dreaded his marriage to Mayl right from the start. There was never any attempt to present motivations for her behavior, beyond “she's a horrible person.” Considering the very balanced way in which Arman was characterized, this bugged me. I didn't necessarily need Mayl to be likable, I just wanted her not to be such a flat character.

All in all, I enjoyed this book and look forward to reading more of this series. I loved these characters and am a little sad that Book 2 jumps 16 years into the future, but I'm hoping that the focus on Karik will allow for a more balanced look at both Prijian and Darshianese societies.

Additional Comments:

This was not an error-free book. There were occasional typos and missing words. They came up often enough that I felt I should mention it, but not so often that they interfered with my enjoyment of the story.

(Original review, with read-alikes, posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)