“The many meanings of Meilan” is a book that resonated with me in so many ways. (Also, did anyone involuntarily imagine hearing the jaunty song “美兰，美兰，我爱你“ play in the background as you read the book?)
Growing up bilingually and bi-culturally, I could identify with so much of what Meilan experienced. From the family drama, to how 千虑一失is as far as it goes for an Asian mother to apologise, to how putting more fish on Grandpa’s plate is a way to make things up to him.
It made me realise how similar Chinese culture is, even though my own parents are second generation immigrants in Southeast Asia, whilst Meilan’s parents were Taiwanese immigrants to the USA. The food, the reticence, the competitiveness when it came to academics – how is the culture so strong that such diverse diaspora have so much in common?
It was a special treat to see familiar idioms and phrases peppered around the book in hanyu pinyin (with tones!), and Andrea Wang does it so elegantly that it does not come across as awkwardly translated or explained in every succeeding phrase. Yet a non-Chinese reader would understand what the phrase meant, unlike how it is with the French phrases in an Agatha Christie Poirot mystery.
“But Māma, my name is not Melanie!” She frowned at my tone. “Rù xiang súi sú.” I glared at her. “I don’t know what that means. not going to the countryside. I’m already in the middle of nowhere.” Mama made a tsk sound that managed to convey both irritation with my lack of Mandarin comprehension and my bad attitude. “It means ‘when you enter a village you follow their customs.'”
Through it all, this is a middle grade story of a girl trying to stay under the radar and invisible so that she does not get picked upon, a girl who feels fluttery twinges when a boy is kind to her, and a girl who has to stand up to a fox-like principal and a snake-like teacher. A story of adventure that all kids will get utterly absorbed in. My daughter really enjoyed this book, though I think not as much as I did, for more of the Mandarin phrases were foreign to her.
I liked the realism portrayed in the book, the pathos of a family broken up because of a feud over money, and the lingering grief of an old Chinese man who lost his most beloved wife. What a rare and precious bond in this day and age, where few elderly couples are truly loving.
[Still pinching myself that I got to meet author Andrea a couple of months ago, and she AUTOGRAPHED this book to me!]
5/5 ⭐️
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