China Room // Book Review

China Room

By Sunjeev Sahota

★★★.5 ☆☆

My thoughts:

What to say about China Room? For one, it was long listed for the Booker Prize, and it’s the second book I’ve read from the list. (The first was Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead, which I read last fall.) Secondly, I have a mind to say that I liked it. But I only liked it despite so much of me wanting to love it. It feels like a book teetering on the edge of greatness, but as I turned the final page I concluded that the book teetered backward, never fulfilling a fantastic what-could-have-been.

The book blurb states that this book is partly inspired by our author’s family history, and as interesting as it is to think that this book may have some autobiographical elements woven throughout the narrative, I also sadly think it’s the book’s achilles heel. We have just 243 pages of this story, but I know I could have gone for twice as many. We get enough of our characters to see that they are rich and complex individuals, but the limited amount of time we spend with them means they don’t get fleshed out. It’s my opinion that this book should have been a long-winded family saga heavy in character development, life experience, and thoughtful introspection. Instead, it felt like walking by a restaurant and smelling mouth-watering aromas but not being able to go inside and sit at a table.

Mai was one of the most interesting characters to me; I wanted more of her. Why did she act the way she did? What happened in her past that she grew to become the woman we see in China Room? What about the three girls: Mehar, Gurleen, and Harbans? With Mehar being one of our main characters, we do see some of her childhood. But I would have liked more about Gurleen and Harbans, too.

In the parts of the book involving our unnamed narrator, I could have done without Radhika’s side plot, as I didn’t feel it added anything to the narrative. But I could have used more on Tanbir, Aunt Kuku, and Uncle Jai. In these sections, the story focused on a less interesting, wannabe love story when we could have dove more into the web of human messiness between characters that were more relevant to our narrator as well as Mehar.

I also would have liked more openness, in general, between the characters. The nature of these arranged marriages, which are the premise of the story, require secretiveness and quick, whispered conversations. But much was left unsaid because of it, and I found the plot wanting more room to breathe life into the pages.

This is purely speculation on my part, but I can’t help but think that Sunjeev Sahota’s limited knowledge about his family history - the secrets that have long been buried over the decades and the skeletons that are pushed so deep into the darkest recesses of a cavernous closet that they will never be found - perhaps, this is why we, as readers, are also left with unanswered questions. Is it possible that Sahota didn’t want to veer too far away from his family’s narrative in fear that embellishment and elaboration would somehow tarnish his real-life history and the circumstances that lead him to where he is now? Like I said, I’m just speculating here, and I certainly wouldn’t want to put words in anyone’s mouth. But at the end of the day, China Room is marketed as historical fiction. The genre allows for creative license, and I can’t help but feel that our author could have given us more of…everything, honestly.

I also struggled with placing myself in the world of this book. The scene descriptions didn’t give me enough to accurately visualize my surroundings. For example, we’re told that we can see multiple villages from the roof of the farm house. But the farm seems far from any town, so just how close are all these locations? A few different fields are mentioned, but I can’t tell how large they are, how they’re separated or connected, or who they may belong to. And the farm house itself, it seems like a compound with multiple, free-standing structures, but again, I can’t quite see how the space is laid out or how large it is.

These kind of world-building details are something I like to have because I want to “see” the story as the author intended. In this case, however, I had to take the little bit that I received and essentially create my own world. It resulted in me feeling disconnected from the setting.

But with all of that said, there’s something deeply moving here, lives that deserve attention. My lasting take is that I liked China Room. It examines a culture I don’t typically read much about, and despite the short length and many unknowns, I still found myself invested in these characters and their well-being. The fact that I desperately wanted more of it (so, so much more) says that there’s a solid foundation for a story that’s demanding to be told. I only wish it had been told more fully, taking its time to weave itself together.