All That
Jazz
There has
been a steady stream of books about the suffering of the women in Afghanistan
under a cruelly patriarchal system, and their courage in coping with it.
Two recent
books bear echoes of Afghanistan and a hint of its horrors for women, but branch
out of there to take in a wider perspective.
Kim Echlin’s
novel, Under The Visible Life is
about the friendship between two women, both mixed race, both musicians, both
caught up in destructive relationships and trying to makes sense of their
lives.
Mahsa’s
Afghan mother had run away with an American man and settled in Karachi. Their
happiness is shattered with Mahsa’s uncles track them down and shoot her
parents. In Pakistan and Afghanistan, honour killing is not even considered a
crime. At thirteen, Mahsa is taken in by a stern uncle and his submissive wife.
Still, she is able to teach herself music and find a piano to practice in a
hotel, where she meets her first love Kamal.
Mahsa is
sent to Canada to study and discovers a freedom unimaginable to women of her
country. Just when she has started to soar, she is forced into marriage with a
much older Ali. She has two children, and carrying on with her music becomes a
constant struggle.
Katherine’s
mother Jenny grew up at a time when her own father could send her to jail for
getting pregnant by a Chinese man. She has to fight to get her child back from
foster care, fight to marry outside her race, and live all her life in a basement
as if to hide from her past. Worse, her husband leaves her and returns to his
wife in China, who Jenny was unaware of.
Katherine
knows what disappointment is, when Theodore, or ‘T’, the black man she falls
for and marries turns out to be fickle and faithless. She has to give up her
dreams of a high flying musical career to look after her three mixed race
children.
The two
women are brought together by their shared love for music and their spirited
piano playing. Women are considered lower species by the music establishment,
still the two work hard and make a small place for themselves.
Even though
the book is about the ability of women to beat the odds, Mahsa and Katherine
are sort of half rebels—they never find the strength to break away from the men
who enslave or disrespect them. The novel is readable and music is the glue
that holds it, but Echelin never goes beyond a soap opera tone—the issues of
race and gender discrimination, raise their heads sporadically, but are pushed
to the background. It had the potential to be a much richer novel, if it had
not managed to bring the outside in; isolated from the social turmoil
surrounding them, Katherine and Mahsa’s lives remain commonplace
Under The Visible Life
By
Kim Echlin
Published by : Serpent's Tail
Pages: 368
****************
Deborah
Rodriguez’s The Little Coffee Shop Of
Kabul, about an American woman, Sunny, who sets up a coffee shop in war
torn Kabul, was a bestseller. Five years later comes a sequel, in which Sunny
has returned to the US, leaving the café in the hands of Yasmina, her husband
Ahmet and mother-in-law Halajan, all of whom appeared in the first book.
The intercuts Sunny’s
efforts to rebuild her life after the sudden death of her husband Jack, and the
problems the new owners of the Kabul coffee shop face in a society that is
resisting change.
Sunny is
talked into taking over the Screaming Peacock vineyard that Jack had bought
against her will. Joe, charming old
Japanese man, and a young, vigorous Sky persuade her to stay on the picturesque
island and give the business a chance.
Yasmina’s sister Layla comes to live with Sunny while she is still
emotionally adrift, so she decides to hire Kat, an Afghan girl as an English
tutor for her guest.
Sunny is
homesick for Kabul, even though it’s a dangerous place and particularly tough
on women. Only a Western woman who does not face any of the problems an Afghan would—violence,
forced marriage, purdah, isolation,
lack of education and opportunity—would romanticize life in Kabul.
The novel
has its charms, and stories of women crossing all hurdles put in their path are
always inspiring. Still, the book just about rises above regular, fluffy chick
lit.
By Deborah
Rodriguez
Published
by: Little Brown/Hachette
Pages: 336
She finds the perfect location in Cypress Key,
but she is up against the town’s mayor, Eben Thinadeaux, who practically owns
the place, and does not want a film crew causing havoc amidst the peaceful
community. He sees the value of
Hollywood dollars fuelling the town’s dud economy, but at same time, he does
not want heritage structures destroyed.
