Review: Never Grow Up (by Jackie Chan, with Zhu Mo)

My Rating: 3.5 stars

I decided to pick up Jackie Chan’s memoir not because I’m a fan (in fact, quite the opposite – he’s actually one of my least favorite celebrities nowadays), but because of nostalgia, as Jackie was a big name in the HK entertainment industry during its heyday in the ‘80s and early ‘90s, when the industry was flourishing.  Back then, the HK entertainment industry was known as “the Hollywood of the East” and rightfully so given the popularity of its stars, who were known all over Asia (and some internationally as well).  As someone who was born in Hong Kong, I’ve always had great affinity for my birth city, which is why it probably won’t come as a surprise that I’ve been following all things HK, especially its entertainment industry, pretty much my entire life.  As such, having grown up on a steady diet of HK movies, TV series, music, books, etc., I’ve become so familiar with the industry that I actually know it better than the “real” Hollywood (significant because I live in Los Angeles, so Hollywood is, basically, in my backyard).  Having devoted so much time and energy to following the industry for decades, I’ve unfortunately also witnessed its deterioration over the years (the past 2 decades especially). Not only that – there’s also the fact that many of the HK celebrities I grew up watching are either retired, less active in the industry, or in some cases, no longer with us (each time I hear about the passing of a HK celebrity, my heart breaks more than a little).  Given these circumstances, it’s understandable then why I would choose to spend time reading a book that 1) is “written” by a HK celebrity that I’m honestly not too fond of, and 2) tells me nothing that I didn’t already know (actually, I probably know more than what Jackie chose to share in his memoir, LOL).

Overall, I would have to say that the experience of reading (or, more accurately, listening, since I went with the audio book version) Jackie’s memoir was enjoyable, primarily because of the nostalgia factor, as he recounts many stories from those “golden years” of the industry that I remember fondly as well.  Of course, given Jackie’s stature as the “big brother” of the HK entertainment industry, he has worked with countless HK celebrities over the years, many of whom get “name-checked” in this memoir (which, to be honest, was my favorite part of the book, as I’m a fan of some of those other celebrities).

One thing that did surprise me about this memoir though is how candidly Jackie talked about some of the scandals as well as the less savory aspects of his personal life, especially in light of the fact that Chinese celebrities (specifically, those who grew up in Asia) are notoriously reticent when it comes to their personal lives. HK celebrities – the more famous ones in particular -- are big on maintaining their privacy and are extremely skilled at playing what I call “verbal tai-chi” with reporters (“verbal tai-chi” essentially means answering questions in a way that doesn’t really reveal anything and deflecting questions without people realizing they are doing it).  This is actually partly why gossip rags are so overwhelmingly popular in HK, since they go to great lengths to dig up the information that the celebrity doesn’t want to reveal.  In Jackie’s case, there are quite a few negative things that he is “known for” in HK (i.e. his carelessness with money, being neglectful toward his son, constantly cheating on his wife, etc. – and I’m only scratching the surface here).  Jackie actually addresses some of these things in his memoir, which I found surprising – though on second thought, some things were spun in a more positive light than how they actually played out (especially his relationships with his wife, retired actress Joan Lin, and son Jaycee – both of which are more strained than he lets on his memoir).

With all that said, one thing I was super curious about (and admittedly one of the reasons why I wanted to read this memoir) was to see if Jackie was going to mention anything about the big scandal that essentially “destroyed” his career and reputation in HK (his 1999 affair with actress Elaine Ng and the daughter from that affair, Etta, whom to this day, he still refuses to acknowledge).  Spoiler alert (well, not really) -- he DOES mention it, but in a roundabout, “blink and you’ll miss it” way – there is a short section where he mentions the “serious mistake” he made in 1999 that “resulted in a love child,” but then goes on to talk about the “media frenzy” that ensued and the impact it had on himself and his family (specifically, Joan and Jaycee) – in essence, he glosses over the situation and his own behavior and instead focuses on how forgiving Joan was towards him.  I will be honest in saying I was disappointed with the way he “kind of did / kind of didn’t” mention it, as I felt this was a missed opportunity to rectify things and salvage some of the respect that was lost (for the record, it was actually this scandal and the horrible way he handled things afterwards that made me lose all respect for him, which is why I said at the beginning of this review that he is one of my least favorite celebrities nowadays), but then again, it IS his memoir so he has the prerogative to write whatever he wants, how he wants.

While I’m glad I read this memoir, I realize that I’m actually not the audience for it.  To me, it seems that Jackie wrote this memoir more for a Western audience that might not know as much about him as those of us from his home town do – or perhaps he wrote it for his fans who probably know everything but love him anyway (which is perfectly fine – to each their own).  All in all, this was an enjoyable, if not particularly insightful, read.

Review: Everyday Movement (by Gigi L. Leung, translated by Jennifer Feeley)

My Rating: 3.5 stars

As the city of my birth, Hong Kong has always occupied a special place in my heart.  Of course, I still have relatives in Hong Kong, but it is really my fondness for the city (despite growing up thousands of miles away in the United States), that has spurred me to continue keeping my birth city front and center.  From a daily life standpoint, I stay abreast of Hong Kong-related news just as much as I keep tabs on everything happening in the U.S.  From an entertainment standpoint, I’m actually more familiar with the goings-on in the HK entertainment industry than I am in Hollywood (which is truly saying something considering I live in Los Angeles, so Hollywood is essentially in my backyard).  With all that said, the one area in my life where HK is a bit less dominant is my reading life, though I have to say that this is by no means deliberate.  As a life-long avid reader, I’ve always been one to read widely, so even though I definitely have favorite genres (i.e. historical fiction, literary fiction, to name two), I don’t like limiting myself to reading only specific genres or specific types of books.  When it comes to Hong Kong books however, I unfortunately don’t have much choice due to the dearth of books about the city published in English (and living in the U.S., it is harder for me to access the Chinese language versions that are usually published exclusively in HK).  So in the rare occurrence where I come across a book either set in Hong Kong or written by a Hong Kong author, I will always be interested in reading it, regardless of subject matter and in spite of any type of feedback regarding the book, whether positive or negative.

With all this in mind, I approached Gigi L. Leung’s novel Everyday Movement with a certain amount of anticipation, despite my usual aversion to reading books that lean heavily toward politics.  Set against the backdrop of the 2019 pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong, Leung’s novel actually consists of a series of interconnected vignettes about people from different walks of life who are impacted by the protests going on all around them.  As the story opens, we get glimpses of what life is like for college roommates Panda and Ah Lei, as they navigate their new reality as active participants in the many protests that occur on Hong Kong’s streets triggered by the central government’s planned implementation of a national security law.  At night, Panda and Ah Lei don their protest gear and are regularly chased and tear gassed by police out on the streets, but during the day, both women go about their usual routines – attending class, going to work, arguing with their parents and with each other, going on lunch and dinner dates, etc.  But underneath the enactment of these everyday routines lies a bubbling tension – a feeling of unease and anxiety for the future, not only of their beloved city, but of their own lives as they know it – that threatens to spill over any minute. Via alternating viewpoints, the story expands outward to capture the moments in the lives of others within the two women’s orbits: there’s Panda’s cousin Ah Mak and the fraught relationship he has with his girlfriend Chan Yeuk over each other’s commitment (or lack thereof) to the protest movement, culminating in a break up that, ironically, brings each of them closer to the other’s viewpoint; there’s Panda’s little sister Sai Mui who, as a pre-teen, is too young to understand everything that is happening around her, yet finds herself caught up in all the tension and anxiety through her sister’s love/hate relationship with their mother as they stand on opposite sides of the movement.  There are others too – periphery characters such as the hairdresser Ning On and the affair she has with a protestor nicknamed “Little Professor” as a means to escape the realities of her life while her daughter Ning Yuet doubles down on her activism; English teacher Ho Sam, a mainlander living in Hong Kong who struggles to reconcile his dueling viewpoints, at once supporting the movement while also opposing it; and finally, Panda’s boyfriend Ah Ming, whose less extreme position in support of the movement as opposed to his girlfriend’s fierce devotion creates an untenable rift in their relationship.

Overall, I felt this novel had a promising premise, but it fell a little bit short for me in terms of its execution.  Subject matter-wise, I appreciate Leung’s candid depiction of the political turmoil and the protests, all of which were rendered viscerally realistic to the point that, at times, I forgot that this is a novel and felt that I was reading a non-fiction book instead. To this point, there was a bit of a journalistic feel to the novel, where it felt as though the author was trying too hard to write from a position of neutrality, which resulted in the writing feeling somewhat stilted and emotionless.  This made it hard for me as a reader to connect with the story or any of its characters – though with all that said, I’m not sure if this was actually an issue with the translation or the author’s writing itself. I also felt that the story didn’t have much of a plot, which is usually not a problem if the characters are well-developed, but in this case, due to the varying viewpoints, the focus was on a bunch of different characters rather than just one or two, resulting in the lack of opportunity to flush out any of the characters fully.  All of this combined was perhaps why I ended up not really feeling anything for any of the characters.

While I’m glad I read this one, I’m also a little bummed that I didn’t end up liking this one as much as I thought I would.  Even though some parts of it didn’t really work for me, I would still recommend this one for its realistic portrayal of the HK protests as well as the timeliness aspect in terms of what has been going on in the U.S. as well as the rest of the world – which, for those impacted, would make this a very relatable read.

Review: Indelible City (by Louisa Lim)

My Rating:  4 stars

I had read Louisa Lim's previous book about the Tiananmen Square Massacre a few years back and one of the things I remember most was how succinctly Lim was able to convey the "collective amnesia" approach that China used to essentially "erase" the incident from its history. Even though that book was written in 2014, I never actually knew of the book's existence until June 2019, when I accidentally stumbled across it and decided, given the familiarity of the subject matter, I just had to read it.  As I mentioned in my review of that book, reading it couldn't have been more timely, since it happened to be right in the middle of the protests in Hong Kong over the extradition law. Coincidentally, now 3 years later, Lim has come out with yet another timely book, this time about those exact events that occurred in Hong Kong in 2019, but also covering the historical details that led up to it. This new book, titled Indelible City, obviously hit much closer to home for me, since I'm from Hong Kong and continue to be intimately connected to the city where I was born, even though it has now became a place that I no longer recognize.

To say that this book is about the protests though is a bit inaccurate, as it's actually about much more than that.  The first half of the book covers the history of Hong Kong, from when it became a British colony in the late 1800s up through the handover back to China in 1997 as well as the immediate years after through the early 2000s.  Interwoven throughout this narrative are background details related to Lim's own experiences as a mixed race Eurasian child who wasn't born in Hong Kong, but grew up there and also lived most of her life there.  Also woven into the narrative is the story of the King of Kowloon, which most Hong Kongers are likely familiar with, but not to the level of detail portrayed in here.  This first half of the book I actually loved because of the way Lim was able to clearly convey the unique history, culture, and identity of Hong Kong — which, to me, is important due to the lack of books out there (written in English) that authentically tell the story of Hong Kong (case in point: I've been searching for these types of books most of my reading life and continue to do so).  Up to this point, the majority of the narratives out there about Hong Kong are either told from the Western perspective or from the Mainland Chinese perspective — both of which are tremendously flawed and rife with biases that favor the side telling the story.  This book is unique in that it is one of the few books out there where the narrative is actually from the Hong Konger's perspective (and Lim definitely did a great job in the book explaining why this is of such huge significance).  I can't emphasize enough how satisfying it is to read about something I'm so intimately familiar with (in this case, the story of Hong Kong) and to see it actually done right — the details from the geography of the city, to the people, the culture, the language, the values that we hold dear, etc — things that someone from the outside who isn't connected to the city would have a difficult time truly understanding. 

Having said all that, the second half of the book was more of a tedious read for me, especially the section that covered the politics-heavy period from the Umbrella Movement in 2014 up through enactment of the national security law in November 2020.  Of course I understand the necessity of including these events due to the outsized role they play in Hong Kong's identity and history, and I definitely appreciate the amount of detail that Lim uses to relay the story — but for someone like me, who 1) hates reading about politics, and 2) was already more than familiar with all the details of those events as they occurred due to my connections to the city (it's not an understatement to say that I lost countless hours of sleep endlessly monitoring the protests and everything that was happening on the ground in Hong Kong at that time) — so seeing all those details rehashed all over again made my head hurt, to be honest.   Again though, this is strictly just me — others who may not be familiar with Hong Kong or the events that occurred the past couple years will likely find these details useful.

I could actually go on and on about this book, as there is so much in here worth bringing up, especially in the context of how much of what Lim writes about actually echoes my own experience of Hong Kong.  But I will refrain, as I prefer that people read this book for themselves first — if anything, for the foundational knowledge that it provides about a city that is often misunderstood.  This book is rare in that it actually gives voice to people whose opinions, throughout history, aren't usually heard or counted: those living in Hong Kong who have no choice but to accept (whether willingly or unwillingly) their fate of forever being rendered invisible.  To me, this aspect alone makes this book worth reading.

Review: Diamond Hill (by Kit Fan)

My Rating: 2 stars

 

I really really wanted to like this book…actually, not just like it, but love it. I mean, how often do I come across a book written in English that is set in my birth city of Hong Kong and is actually about HK people, places, culture, history, etc.  After reading the premise, my expectation was that this would be a story that was truly HK-focused, with an authentic portrayal of the city that wasn't written from a primarily Western point of view.  Going into this, I was excited and kept thinking to myself — finally, a book about the old HK that will satisfy the nostalgia I've been feeling lately about a city I've always loved, but had become increasingly foreign to me in recent years.  I went into this with high hopes and also preparing to rate it highly.  Unfortunately, this book turned out to be nothing like what I expected (in a bad way) and after reading it, instead of feeling nostalgic, I actually ended up feeling frustrated and disappointed.

 

The biggest issue I had with this book was that the writing was very disjointed and uneven, which wouldn't have been as bad of a problem except that the story overall was also poorly executed — both of these things, along with several other issues I found, made this an extremely frustrating read for me. In fact, I had actually wanted to DNF this book several times (which is not a good sign, as I'm a stickler for finishing every book I read), but I pressed on, reminding myself every couple pages of all the things I had mentioned above about why I had been so excited to read this.  I ultimately finished, but not without resorting to skimming the last 50 pages or so (because by that point, I was already at my wit's end).

 

The main thing about the writing and execution that frustrated me was the constant switching back and forth between style and tone — one minute, the writing would be eloquent, descriptive, even philosophical, but then the next minute, the writing would descend into profanity-laced vulgarities that seemed to come out of nowhere.  If this happened only once or twice, then it wouldn't be a problem, but the writing actually alternated between these two extremes for the entire story.  As if that weren't enough, there was also a lot of switching back and forth between English and either formal Chinese or Cantonese slang (with English translation in parentheses next to it) — normally, I would be happy to see a book written in English about Chinese culture / experience utilize Chinese characters as needed to enhance the story, but in this case, the switching was done haphazardly, in a random way that made absolutely no sense to me — for instance, randomly inserting Chinese (with English translation) in the middle of characters' dialogues or having some side character who only shows up for like a minute blurt out a bunch of profanities in Cantonese as a main character passes by.  Again, I would be fine with it if incorporating these phrases served a purpose in the story, advanced the plot, or were necessary to characterization— but none of it did…the phrases that the author chose to write in Chinese didn't seem to have any rhyme or reason to them.  From a character perspective, it didn't make sense for some of the characters to speak a hybrid of English / Cantonese to the extent that these characters did (yes, some Hong Kongers do mix some English in their speech, but most ordinary folks don't constantly switch back and forth between the two languages like that unless they're bicultural or they were educated overseas or in an international school where everything is taught in English).  It almost seemed like the author couldn't decide whether he wanted to write in English or Chinese and so decided to do a hodgepodge of both.  

In addition, I also found the prolific and gratuitous use of Cantonese slang words and profanities throughout the story not only unnecessary, but also annoying.  In the Author's Note at the end of the book, Kit Fan explains that he included the Cantonese slang and profanities in both Chinese and English throughout the book in order to "give a culturally distinctive inflection to a language that is under threat, not unlike the shanty town in the novel" – while I agree with the sentiment that Cantonese is a language that has increasingly come under threat over the years, I disagree with the method of sprinkling 'random Cantonese profanities + their English translations' throughout the story as a means of preserving the "vitality of the language."  Even if the author wanted to show the distinctive cultural flavor of Cantonese slang (or the language as a whole), incorporating a few phrases here and there would've been enough — but inundating the story with it, especially when majority of the slang and profanities were irrelevant to the story, that's going overboard in my opinion.  In terms of the translations in parentheses— perhaps because I am both a Cantonese and English speaker myself (as well as a translator for the Chinese/English language pairing), this method especially frustrated me, as my brain is wired to automatically compare the Chinese and English to see if it was translated correctly (quite a bit of it actually wasn't), so each time it switched to Chinese, I got jarred out of the story – basically, rather than enhancing the story or helping me appreciate it more, the Chinese words and phrases with its translations ended up being a distraction that made it difficult to concentrate on the story itself.

 

Speaking of the story – well, this was another aspect that I found problematic.  First of all, there wasn't really a plot to speak of – there were a lot of detailed descriptions of places and characters' surroundings, but little to no substance in terms of what actually happens.  If I had to summarize this book, I would say that it is essentially an "information dump about HK" – there is an abundance of name-dropping of various HK people, places, things, historical events, cultural aspects, etc., almost all of which would be recognizable to anyone decently familiar with the city, but none of it advanced the plot and very little (if any) was actually relevant to the story.  Even the characters had no depth to them -- it seemed like the main purpose of the characters was to either 1) describe their surroundings, or 2) regurgitate heaps of (oftentimes unnecessary and irrelevant) information about HK to anyone who would listen, or 3) insult others with some type of profanity / vulgarity and/or drop a random Chinese idiom in the middle of a lengthy, rambling discourse about things may or may not have been important, but I had already stopped caring by that point.

 

What bothered me most about this book though was the stereotypical way in which all the female characters were portrayed in the story.  Of course, I wasn't expecting a male author to write complex female characters completely accurately, but I was disappointed (and more than a bit miffed) that the author seemed to go the route of portraying all the women as sexual stereotypes who essentially fell into three categories:  the uptight, sex-deprived nun; the promiscuous, 'gangster wannabe' tomboy;  and the sex-crazy, possibly a little unhinged prostitute.  Though I understand that these portrayals probably weren't intentional on the author's part, as a woman, I found such depictions offensive and worrisome, especially since we've seen over the past year how harmful perpetuating such stereotypes can be.  

 

With all that said, I do believe in giving credit where it's due and so I have to say that the author did a pretty good job giving readers unfamiliar with HK a better understanding of what life in Diamond Hill was like back in the day.  The feelings of despair and uncertainty that were pretty widespread throughout HK in the years after the signing of the Joint Declaration were also well-depicted — feelings that were exacerbated tenfold after what happened in Tiananmen in 1989 (and sparked fears about the fate of Hong Kongers after the handover).

Even though this book absolutely didn't work for me, I am clearly the exception here given all the 4 and 5 star reviews I've seen for this one.  So I would say check out the other reviews so you can make an informed decision on whether you'd be interested in reading this one. 

Received ARC from World Editions via Edelweiss.

  

 

 

Review: Bruce Lee: A Life (by Matthew Polly)

My Rating: 5 stars 

As I've mentioned in other reviews, I was born in HK and even though I've lived in the U.S. for most of my life, that has not stopped me from having a strong connection to the place of my birth.  My fondness for HK runs deep and even though it is a very different place now from what it was when I first grew to know the city back in the 1980s, my affinity for it has not waned.  Because of this background, I've always been sensitive about how HK is portrayed, especially by the Western world and those who may or may not be familiar with the city's language, culture, history, etc.  Don't get me wrong – I'm not saying that HK always has to be portrayed in a good light because we all know that bad things do happen there as they do everywhere in the world and bringing that stuff to light is absolutely necessary…rather, my concern has always been that the portrayal is accurate and fair, which, for those who do not already have familiarity with HK and/or Chinese culture, may mean doing the research necessary to ensure integrity of the portrayal is preserved.  For me, authenticity is important when it comes to non-fiction portrayals of real-life events and absolutely, when it comes to biographies of real-life people, especially those who are no longer around to either validate or refute what is being written about their lives.  

I must admit when I first found out that American martial arts and travel writer Matthew Polly was releasing an authoritative biography on Hong Kong martial arts legend Bruce Lee, the question of authenticity did come into my mind initially.  Knowing virtually nothing about Polly prior to starting this book, I wondered how this biography would play out.  Would this book be in the same vein as some of the other English language books out there that have attempted to cover certain aspects of Bruce's life but never really managed to be comprehensive?  Or would this one focus heavily on the martial arts aspect, on Wing Chun and Jeet Kune Do and Chinese kung fu, with the actual details of Bruce's life merely a side story?  At minimum, I thought for sure this biography would focus more heavily on the Western portrayal of Bruce's life, his studies in the United States, his stint in Hollywood, his many celebrity friends as well as students, his relationship with his wife Linda, etc.  – basically a lot of what had already been said in the innumerable library of source material on Bruce Lee (whether books, magazines, newspapers, movies, TV shows, etc.).

Given the above, it should come as no surprise then, that I had mixed feelings at first going into this read.  On the one hand, I was excited, since, after all, this is a biography about one of Hong Kong's penultimate cultural icons.  My connection with the city aside, it is not lost on me that there has always been (and continues to be) very little Asian (more specifically Chinese) representation in the American literary world and representation from Hong Kong is minimal at best -- so when I saw that someone actually took the time to write an extensive biography about one of my birth city's greatest self-made superstars, I jumped at the opportunity to read this massive book (and yes, at 656 pages, this book is indeed MASSIVE), despite the fact that, like most Hong Kongers, I already knew pretty much everything there was to know about Bruce Lee's short but vibrant life.  On the other hand, I was skeptical, as Bruce Lee was one of those rare celebrities who became a bona fide international icon almost entirely posthumously and I frankly did not know what to expect.

Now after finishing this book (and yes I'm proud to say I read every single page, cover to cover, including the 200+ pages of notes and references as well as extensive bibliography), I have to say that my initial reservations were unwarranted, as this biography exceeded my expectations and then some!  I am pleasantly surprised, delighted, and absolutely in awe at the amount of research that went into this book! What made this particular biography about Bruce Lee stand out from all the previous works that had been written about him was the tremendous depth of coverage – not just the fact that the narrative covered nearly every aspect of Bruce's life from birth to death in great detail, but also the extensive detail about Hong Kong itself – the historical background, insight into the culture, coverage of the HK entertainment industry and who all the major players were back then, the background on Bruce's family, the various personal as well as celebrity friends and acquaintances he had over there, etc. (I was surprised to see so many familiar names and places in the book – stuff I rarely ever see in books about HK written in English).  As the author Matthew Polly states in his Afterword, over the past four and a half decades, it seems like every single person who ever knew Bruce Lee at some point has written a book about him — while this is true, my opinion is that many of these works have in common is that most were written from the perspective of the writer's own memories and what they remembered about their interactions with him, but very few (if any) featured the extensive amount of research and fact-checking that went into this biography.  In his author's note, Polly talks about his methodology and the prep work that went into writing this book: "I watched everything Bruce had ever done and took copious notes.  I read everything that had ever been written about Bruce and took copious notes.  And then I interviewed everyone who had ever known Bruce and was willing to talk and took copious notes.  Then I compiled these notes into a single Word document in chronological order.  The final file was over 2,500 pages and a million words long."  And also this:  "The process took over six years.  I spent six months in Hong Kong and another two in Los Angeles and Seattle.  Along the way, I interviewed over a hundred people and met with many others who were helpful in countless ways."

For me, what mattered the most with this book wasn't necessarily the content itself, but rather, the effort that was put in and the exhaustive lengths the author went through to ensure that his final product does justice to its subject.  Of all the books I've read in my lifetime (so far), this was the first time where, upon finishing the ARC version of this book, I immediately went and purchased the final published version because I knew that I absolutely had to "collect" this book for my personal library.  If I didn't already have a long list of books that I still needed to get to, there's no doubt that I would've launched into an immediate re-reading of this book, though this time with the notes side-by-side for comparison.  What I loved most about this book is that -- unlike many of the other books / magazines / articles out that have been written over the years that portray a largely romanticized, idealized, and at times even bordering on caricature version of Bruce Lee, this author chose to go the opposite direction and present Bruce as he was in real life:  as an ordinary guy with an extraordinary personality and a charming, larger-than-life persona, but also more character flaws than can be counted on two hands.  In striving to present the human side of Bruce, Polly laid out everything as is, both the good and the bad, but more importantly, he explained with the most thoroughness that I've seen thus far, the significance of Bruce Lee's legacy and why it still matters today.  This is one of those books that deserves not just to be read -- complete from the Prologue to the Epilogue and everything in between, including the Afterword, the notes, and the bibliography --  but also explored, savored, and cherished (for me personally, the Epilogue and Afterword were my favorite parts of the book).

I've always found it difficult to summarize someone's entire life in a few short paragraphs so I'm not going to even try it with this review.  Instead, I encourage those reading this review to experience the book for yourself, whether you are a fan of Bruce Lee and/or martial arts or not.  The historical and cultural aspects of Hong Kong are well-depicted in here and for that alone, especially for those who may not be familiar with Hong Kong, this is an insightful read.  For those curious about Hollywood in the 1960s and 70s, the film-making process, what it was like for celebrities during that time, the lifestyle, the environment, this book gives an interesting glimpse into that era.  If you are into martial arts and wanted to explore that angle of Bruce's life, this book does a great job breaking down the basics as it relates to Bruce's philosophy and how Jeet Kune Do came to be (and it's done in a way that folks with little to no knowledge / interest in martial arts like me can easily understand).  And finally, if you are a Bruce Lee fan, you should definitely read this book, as it is a sincere and fascinating exploration of the short  yet dynamic life of one of the most recognizable names on the planet.

This year marks the 45^th anniversary of Bruce Lee's death.  Even though this book was published last month (in June) and I've had the ARC sitting in my queue for a few months already, I actually didn't crack this book open until this week – in fact, I started reading this on July 20^th (I'm sure it is not lost on Bruce Lee fans the significance of this date) and despite its length (600+ pages!), I plowed through it in 4 days (definitely a record for me).  Beyond Bruce Lee's legacy and what he is known for in the international arena – his martial arts, his film career, his mysterious and sudden death, his scandals and high-profile relationships, his vitality and his larger-than-life persona – the biggest significance for me as a Chinese-American who, like Bruce, had one foot firmly planted in the East and the other equally in the West,  is the fact that he broke through cultural barriers, transformed long-held, misguided perceptions about Asians in the Western world, and through his example, empowered us to believe in ourselves, in our self-worth, and the possibility to achieve what was previously unachievable; he opened the doors for us and gave us a voice.  The part that resonates with me the most and, for me, will always be the true legacy that Bruce Lee left us is summed up in this passage from the Epilogue where Polly writes:  "But perhaps most important in this age of polarization and ethnic strife is the example he [Bruce] set and espoused.  As a Eurasian, he faced discrimination from both sides of the East/West divide.  He never let it stop him.  Instead, he preached a message of post-racial unity. [When asked whether he felt he was more Chinese or more American, Bruce would often answer] 'I think of myself as a human being, because under the sky, there is but one family.  It just so happens that people are different.'  And he practiced it.  He accepted anyone who wanted to learn from him.  His first student in America was Jesse Glover [a black man whom everyone he approached refused to teach purely because of the color of his skin].  'If he felt you were sincere, Bruce taught you, ' [his student] Taky Kimura recalls.  'He didn't care what race you were.'"  In the decades since Bruce Lee's death, our world has greatly evolved and many things have changed, both for better and for worse – in the area of race relations, while there has been significant progress, we are still far from the ideal of "post-racial unity" that Bruce preached.  I cannot say for sure whether we will ever get there, but one thing's for sure -- the road, while definitely still bumpy and difficult, is a lot smoother now for Asian-Americans than it was back during that time and without a doubt,  Bruce Lee was instrumental in making that happen.  For that, I am grateful!

Received ARC from Simon & Schuster via NetGalley.

Review: History's Fiction - Stories from the City of Hong Kong (by Xu Xi)

My Rating:  3 stars

I was born in Hong Kong and even though I had never really lived there due to my family immigrating to the U.S. when I was a baby, I’ve always had an inexplicable attraction towards the city of my birth.  I follow HK news daily, sometimes even more so than news about the U.S. or local news about the state where I currently live.  I watch a lot of HK movies and drama series and also follow the HK entertainment scene very closely (despite living in Los Angeles, I can’t begin to tell you who the current rising stars are in Hollywood because I honestly don’t pay much attention, but ask me who the most popular HK celebrities are and I can probably talk your ear off).  As an avid reader, I also naturally gravitate towards books that have a Hong Kong element to them – i.e.:  books set in HK, about HK people or culture, written by HK authors, etc.  I’ve never really understood why, throughout my life, I’ve always had such an affinity for a city that I barely lived in and certainly didn’t grow up in – to this day, I still don’t really understand, but regardless, I’ve come to embrace the city as a place very near and dear to my heart.  Nowadays, every time the words “Hong Kong” comes up, whether in casual conversation with friends, in the media, on television, in books, etc., my ears automatically perk up.  There’s a constant curiosity within me to see how my birth place is depicted, especially to those who may not be familiar with the city. 

When I first heard that a compilation of HK author Xu Xi’s short stories would be republished in a new  collection to be released this year, I was excited and quickly picked up the collection as soon as it was released several months ago.  I’ve read some of Xu Xi’s works before, but it was a long time ago, back during a time when I read more casually and didn’t really have the foresight to understand or appreciate what I was reading.  Things are different now of course and having experienced what I have over the years, I tend to approach most of what I read with the hope of forming a “personal connection” in some way.  With short stories, especially ones that have completely different characters and little to no linkage from one story to the next, this type of connection is hard to establish, which is why I’m not much of a fan of short story collections in general.  The stories in this particular collection were actually ones that Xu Xi wrote throughout her long, illustrious career, with the oldest one written back in 1981 and the most recent one from 2001 (this is actually the second printing of the book – it originally came out back in August 2001).  Not having read this collection back when it was originally published in 2001, this was my first experience reading Xu Xi’s short stories and I have to admit that it was different from what I expected.  This was a mixed bag of sorts – an eclectic combination of stories, all set in Hong Kong, with the common theme of being infused with doses of Hong Kong history spanning 3 decades (from the 1960s up through HK’s return to China in 1997) that serve as the backdrop for each story.  I was expecting the stories to all have a “uniqueness” to them that was distinctly and recognizably HK and while most of them did, there were a few that I felt were a bit too “generic,” almost as though they could’ve taken place anywhere else other than HK.  Also, a few of the stories felt incomplete, as though we as readers were only being treated to a small “snippet” of the story and would have to go hunt down the continuation elsewhere.  In reading through Xu Xi’s author notes and acknowledgments at the beginning of the book, it does seem that each story was excerpted from various publications over a span of 20 years – some of the stories were originally published in magazines and newspapers, a few were from earlier short story anthologies, two were actually excerpts from novels, and two were originally manuscripts broadcast on the radio.  I’m not too sure why these particular stories were selected to be included in this collection, but I think the way these stories were pulled together (being from so many different sources and formats) affected my ability to connect with some of the stories as much as I wanted to.  I would prefer to have read these stories from the original source where they were initially published, within the original context of the stories, rather than excerpts from a longer anthology or novel.  This was the main reason for me rating this collection only 3 stars, as I put a little more weight on the impact to my personal reading experience than I did to the contents of the stories themselves.  With that said, I do appreciate the fact that Xu Xi listed in detail the original sources that these stories came from in her Acknowledgements page so I can at least go back and hunt down those sources and perhaps re-read these stories in their original context someday.

Overall, I would say that for those who may not be familiar with Hong Kong and its history, this collection is a good way to “get your feet wet” – plus the way Xu Xi blended history and fiction together was well-done and made the history portion especially accessible to those who may not be too keen on reading history straight from textbooks.  One thing to note is that Xu Xi is one of the few writers born and raised in HK who actually writes entirely in English rather than Chinese, so at least we don’t have to worry about aspects of her stories being “lost in translation” (something that I’m very particular about).  With all that said however, I would recommend reading these stories in their original form if possible (i.e.: from the sources in which they were originally published) so as to do justice to Xu Xi’s skills as a writer and story-teller, which stands out less in this story collection than it does in her other works.