#42// what not to (shrug emoji)

shrug emoji

Dear Reader,
How are you? Instead of a crisp autumn, it has been a gloomy, rainy one. Cosy sweaters are out, and I have been diligently lighting scented candles that make the house smell like caramel in coffee. There is something witchy, cosy, calming about sweaters and candles and coffee and a good book. (I drink more warm water than coffee). This is the time when I think about books that I love but also about books that were different from my expectations.
 

Read

And that brings us to What not to.
 
Nope, this doesn’t mean the books listed below are bad. Not at all (though I would not recommend some of them). But it means they delivered something different from what I expected. Sometimes this was a good surprise, and sometimes not.

Perhaps the book that crushed my hopes the most was Portrait of a Thief by Grace D Li. Is it a good book? Oh yes. But the false marketing and hype left me frustrated. This was marketed as an Asian heist story, the Asian Ocean’s Eleven. Now, I am a BIG fan of heists and Ocean’s Eleven (we don’t count Ocean’s Eight though I did champion for it when it was released. Girl power and all, but in hindsight I admit it was a poorly made heist movie with some great actors, who btw deserve a lot more and a better script). But the only relation between Portrait of a Thief and Ocean’s Eleven is that it is a heist (shrug emoji) and the name ‘Ocean’s Eleven’ is mentioned a couple of times. I call this the dangerous marketing—when you put images and expectations in the mind of the reader and the book is nothing like it. Where’s the action, the execution, the snazzy style of Ocean’s Eleven? The gang in Portrait of a Thief steals, that’s pretty much it. (Read on, the book is bigger than simply stealing things btw). Where’s the behind-the-scenes planning? How detailed are the plans and execution? Ocean's Eleven where are you?

However, this IS a good book. It is more literary than a cinematic heist. It raises questions of identity, colonialism. It makes you think about children who identify with a different country than their parents, it talks about gaps between such parents and children. It makes you worry about children caught in-between two countries, two cultures. It examines—who owns pieces on display in museums? Where does the loyalty lie? Where is the line between parents’ dreams and your own? I hear a TV show is in the works, and I think it’s gonna be great. As for the book, read it without heeding the marketing tags or Tiktok aesthetics.

I had similar thoughts about The Verifiers by Jane Pek about a Chinese American amateur detective working for a dating agency. I kind of expected something lighter, but no complaints because I enjoyed The Verifiers very much, even though at times it felt overloaded with many themes—immigrant problems, queer existence in immigrant families of color, data mining, privacy concerns in the age of internet. I was invested in the story and I would recommend it if you can sit through an occasional too-many-themes syndrome. It is well written and kept me thinking about it for days. I wrote about it in detail in this newsletter. Vauhini Vora’s The Immotal King Rao was a bit different from my expectations; I expected more action from the strong women. After all, it is an alternate world. But I thoroughly enjoyed it and I would recommend it. My thoughts on the book are beyond the scope (word count) of this newsletter—(Pick it up!)—so if you are interested, check the Books 2022 highlight on my Instagram.

Among light hearted reads, I was really thrilled by the premise of Yinka, Where is your Huzband by Lizzie Damilola Blackburn about aunties pestering a woman to get married. While the premise was fun, I found the writing to be too preachy. It’s something I dislike in books, when the plot/book is trying too hard to nail down ideas into the reader’s head. Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala which was a @thesatchelbookclub read, was alright, but not as fun as I expected a food+murder story to be. The food vibes were mostly limited to mentions, than descriptions (I ordered a novel not a menu), and frankly I did not care for the love triangle at all. I am interested in future works by the author, but perhaps not so keen on this particular series. On the other hand, I read the other book which lost the book club poll for the same month, Finlay Donovan is Killing it by Ellie Cosimano,expecting it to be hyped. But I enjoyed it alot. Single mom and struggling crime novelist is mistaken for an assassin and signs a murder deal for $$. Yes, please.
 
Another book that I had high hopes for was Samantha Downing’s He Started It, which started off as a road trip with murderous intents and gets very boring that you wish everybody would simply kill each other. Instead, let me recommend you the excellent thrillers—My Lovely Wife (about a manipulative husband and wife who are serial killers) and her newest For Your Own Good (set in a private boarding school with teachers with god-complex. It’ll make you rethink coffee breaks). I loved both of them immensely. Instead of Tara Isabella Burton's latest The World Cannot Give set in a Christian private school in Maine, pitched as The Secret History meets Price of Salt, pick up her Social Creature, a propulsive, dark tale of obsession which is a stunningly good read.

For middle grade lovers—Some of you are going to hate me because this is such a popular series—I was disappointed with Murder Most Unlady Like/Murder is Bad Manners by Robin Stevens. Again, hopes were high because this is a boarding school murder mystery starring a Chinese girl Hazel Wong and a white girl Daisy Wells, set in 1930s. Checks all my boxes, honestly. I was in for a bad surprise.
 
I don’t expect books set in a certain time period to be curtailed to modern thinking. So yes, the racism against Asians in 1930s in elite boarding schools is a reality explored in fiction and I don’t mind reading about it. But what really bothered me is how this whole story is written with a white lens. Daisy is a beautiful, blue-eyed blonde (repeatedly described). Hazel is the meek model Asian that the white gaze expects in fiction. ‘Who ever has heard of a Chinese Sherlock Holmes’ Hazel says. Her Asian-ness is limited to craving moon cakes in school (search the depths of the internet where Asians say this is not what an Asian middle grader would crave in the context of the book), and having no self-confidence even though she is the cleverer one. Hazel is the narrator; imagine reading a whole middle grade book with a self-deprecating POV—she thinks she is ugly, laments her black hair and eyes, aspires to be like the white girl, puts up with the mean Daisy, gets manipulated, shoved aside, dismissed, you name it. You could argue that Sherlock Holmes wasn’t ‘nice’ to Watson—I say read the book and decide for yourself if that’s a Holmes-Watson thing or a white-POC thing. The internalized racism, the mean-ness of Daisy Wells, oh my god. Girls can be mean of course, but there is no redemption OR no-redemption arc. Why does Hazel Wong aspire so much to be like Daisy? Even in the apology scene, Hazel Wong does not ‘demand’ it (I was really hoping, THAT would be a slight redemption from the self-deprecating self) but rather it is given to her in an off-hand way. Nothing active; all passive. Give the minimum to a character and let them be grateful for it. I don’t mind flawed characters or stories without morals. I know that the characters are differently crafted than in, say, a literary novel. What I do mind is the marketed ‘friendship’ between the girls is not a friendship or even symbiotic, the glorification of Daisy Wells who definitely should not have been on a pedestal, and the exoticization of Hazel Wong.  I would call this series a Wells mystery with a token Asian side character (Why have Hazel narrating then? To sing praises of the middle grade equivalent of a mediocre white man who puts in little to no effort?). I would’ve maybe enjoyed this if this was a regular boarding school mystery with no token POC in the disguise of a main character.

Ending on a good note—If you’d like to read a book that isn’t what you expect (perhaps you watched the TV adaptation which was good and assumed the books read the same?), that is Paper Girls. The TV show marketed as Amazon Prime’s answer to Stranger Things (a so-so tagline) is lovely (a bit slow) set in 1980s. The graphic series is equally lovely but nothing at all like the adaptation. The TV adaptation is more emotional and rides big on teen anxiety and adventure. If you’ve read the series, you might notice that a single comic box might be a 10 minute scene in the series. The books are absolute bonkers; more sci-fi, more madcap adventures, and bizarre. There's time travel, dinosaurs, huge space ship like things, a bermuda wearing Grandfather and so much more. The TV show made me ‘feel’ things and the graphic novels made me ride high on adrenaline—Read it, watch it.
 

Watch

What not to—I watched Hush Hush on Prime about four rich women with secrets. Honestly, I am bored of these modern, liberal, stereotyped women shown on Indian TV (smoking, and ample fucks in every sentence PS: sometimes the dialogues felt so forced. Like somebody thought ‘ok, that’s the script. Now let us randomly add ‘fuck’ wherever to make them cool). I went in expecting a strong drama with strong characters, a good suspense thriller, but honestly it was boring, with bad acting (to the point that I was shocked by the bad acting).
 
I also watched Oru Thekkan Thallu Case on Netflix, a Malayalam movie starring excellent actors. At first it seemed interesting as a simple story with comedic moments set in a small village, shown through a masculine lens. Fights fueled by ego, and women who aren’t ashamed about their sexuality. Soon enough it becomes a misogynistic tale with a dragging plot and absolute cringe dialogues (also normalization of domestic violence). The women Padmapriya and Nimisha Sajayan gave great performances as women in a man’s world. But this is drowned by the fact that they are merely objects to take the men’s ‘revenge story + consequences plotline’ forward. I wish Biju Menon, who is an amazing actor, would be more selective in his roles; the masculine-tinged movies are getting stale even for those who do enjoy such movies. Roshan Matthew acted well as the egositic, good-for-nothing Podiyan, but eventually no matter how good the actors are, a weak plot destroys a movie. Even the climax, which is supposed to be an applause-moment for Padmapriya became absolute cringe with her dialogue about the men in the picture. Also, the subtitles didn’t convey the exact meaning of the Malayalam dialogues (there was a song where the subtitles read breast milk but the line meant river of love or something. I don’t think there was a double meaning there, I checked with a few Malayalees, but then…(shrug emoji)..I really don't know). So, if you don’t know Malayalam, maybe give this one a miss.
 

Book Club Read

The Satchel Book Club has been busy the last few months reading a graphic novel (Lore Olympus in September) and a gothic novel (The Thirteenth Tale in October). We will be taking a break in December. Our last readalong of 2022 would be The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman in November. It is a completely fuss-free space where you read at your own pace and the only rule is to simply read. Join us!
 

Best books for autumn

Nothing's better than a good old Tana French mystery. If you've been wondering where to start with, hunting for a definitive ranking of these mysteries, I've got you covered, my friend. If you are a seasoned Tana French reader, what are your favourites?

Amazing Links

How to professionally say?
Now you can design your interiors with AI and it works
Food shows on Netflix
How bakeries redefined Kerala  (The News Minute)
Short story: Dorothy Dancer has had enough  (Catapult)

That was a long one. Consider it the Sept & Oct edition.
I hope you’ve been keeping well. Write to me, I love hearing from you.


Until next time,
Resh x

(This newsletter may contain affiliate links which might earn me a very small commission at no extra cost to you)

If you liked this newsletter, the best way to show support would be to forward the subscribe link to a friend or share via your favourite social media.