The Astonishing Color of After - Emily X.R. Pan

The Astonishing Color of After by Emily X.R. Pan is one of the best novels I’ve read this year so far. It is about suicide and depression, about losing someone, about love, about art and colors, friendship and finding yourself. About parents. 

As you can see, the novel has many many layers. So many, in fact, it might have been a little too much but I didn’t think one layer wasn’t well worked out. 

It is the story about a teenage girl, Leigh, whose mother committed suicide. Her mother suffered from depression for a long time, and decides to commit suicide. The Astonishing Color of After starts with the suicide of Leigh’s mother and in the story Leigh tries to deal with this loss of her mother who, according to Leigh, has turned into a bird. 

Leigh and her father go to Leigh’s mother’s parents in Taiwan, because Leigh wants to understand her mother’s decision and craves answers. In Taiwan Leigh gets to know her mother better by learning things about her mother’s past. 

I really loved the composition of the story, because there were different periods of time. 

We have the ‘now’, where Leigh is in Taiwan with her grandparents figuring things out about her mother. We have the memories of the past, where Leigh is very little or not born and we learn about the past of Leigh’s family. 

And we have the memories of Leigh herself about the past two or three years which is mostly about her friendship with her best friend Axel, who know each other so well that they only have to ask ‘What color?’ to understand the other’s mood and feelings. The colors are also a big theme in this novel, of course. Leigh is an artist, and she knows a lot about the different colors. I don’t mean she knows blue from green etc, but she knows the different types of green and the different types of blue. In the novel, you don’t see Leigh giving colors to her emotions per se but you do see her referencing different colors of clothes people wear of the color of some element. I think all of these colors do each stand for a particular emotion, even if this isn’t mentioned directly.  

In the parts of the ‘now’, magical realism is very prominent. At first, I thought I wouldn’t like the use of magical realism in a story about loss, a story which is not fantasy but fiction. However, it was well explained (indirectly) why magical realism was used in this story and it was a perfect addition to The Astonishing Color of After. 

Because of the magical realism the reader (and Leigh) could get the entire story, the entire history of the family and made you as the reader understand a lot more about Leigh’s mother and her mother’s family. 

I also enjoyed the friendship/relationship part of the novel because it wasn’t really prominent. It was not the main focus of the novel, but it did make for a very complete story to add this to all the other layers of the novel. 

I think The Astonishing Color of After was, apart from dealing with the loss of a parent, a search to find oneself. Leigh gets to know herself more because she gets to know the past of her mother which was always missing. Without the magical realism used in the story, this search wouldn’t have been so prominent and clear. Leigh was able to find herself because of her mother’s suicide and the knowing of her mother’s past. 

I thought I would have a lot more to say about this novel, but it turns out I don't really want to write anything else about this since it would ruin the story for you if you haven’t read the novel yet. So I will be shutting up now, and you can get to reading this novel for yourselves!

I have given The Astonishing Color of After 4,5 stars. Not the highest score, because some parts of the ‘now’ were slowgoing and a little bit boring at some points. 

Her Body and Other Parties - Carmen Maria Machado

So yeah, I finished this book yesterday and I was struggling a little bit with what I wanted to say about this book. On the one hand, I didn't quite know what I thought of the book, because I didn't understand every message the book tried to convey. On the other hand, I did really love the way the stories were written, not with all of them but with most of them I really liked the built-up and the wording. What I was struggling with the most, was the meaning of each of the stories but I have looked this up and tried to utilize my own interpretation of the significance of each of the stories. Now I think I have a good idea of what Machado tried to say with all of her stories, at least now they mean something to me! 

Her Body and Other Parties is a collection of 8 short stories, which all have something to do with women and their bodies. The first short story is The Husband Stitch. This story held my attention the entire time and made me want to read the other stories (which in all fairness did not live up to this first amazing story). It tells the love story of a man and a woman, who met each other when they were teenagers and fell in love at that time. The story describes their sexual encounters vividly, and eventually they get married and have a son. During the entire story the woman has a green ribbon tied around her neck. The man wants to know why she has that ribbon and wants to untie the ribbon from around her neck. The woman doesn't let him, and later in the story is revealed that every woman has a ribbon somewhere on their bodies. 

I won't spoil the ending of the story, but I will move on to the message the short story has. The green ribbon is a metaphor for the one thing that all women have and should hold on to. It can be seen as the one thing that holds their individuality. Women should not give this ribbon to a man (or anyone), they shouldn't untie it. At least, this was the message I saw in this ribbon after I read some explanations. I think everyone should read this story and see for themselves what they think the ribbon is a metaphor for. 

There were a couple of stories which I did not find particularly interesting and which I have given the lowest ratings. One of those stories was Inventory, which was basically a list of sexual encounters one woman has had in her life whilst some sort of illness roamed the earth. I did not find the story very compelling, and I didn't quite understand the meaning of the story. After I looked this up, the meaning became a little bit clearer though I didn't understand what this had to do with women per se. Machado wrote this story to show that people need closeness, need love, need each other even if being close meant that they would get sick and perhaps die. I think this message is really beautiful, but I didn't understand why this particular story was needed in a book that was mainly about women and their struggles. I have thought a long time about the rating I wanted to give this story, and eventually I came to 3 stars. This because I didn't particularly like the set-up of the story, it was a little boring to listen to this story sometimes. I did like the message it conveyed though, I think the message is relevant for everyone but not in particular for women. 

Another story I didn't understand the message of, which had the same set-up as Inventory and which was too long for my taste, was Especially Heinous. I gave this story also 3 stars, the same as Inventory. The story entails 12 seasons of Law & Order, with small summaries of each episode. In this way, we see a story unfold over time. The message this short story tried to tell, was the way women are victimized by society and themselves, especially on TV. On TV, we see the rape and murder of women and the trauma which follows this. Machado wanted to zoom in on this trauma and the obsession which follow these things, and embellish them to make the story absurd and surreal to show women that it is okay to joke about this stuff etc. 

I have not yet talked about the 5 remaining stories, but I will not be talking about these stories in depth. I picked The Husband Stitch to talk about in depth, because this was the best story I read, and I think this message is the most important message to remember for all women. I thought a long time about this message, and I know this message will stay with me for a long time. I even think I might re-read this short story. I have picked the Inventory and Especially Heinous stories because they were surprising to me, I couldn't even have guessed that the message was what it eventually was, and I had to think long and hard about this message to be able to see how it fit in the story. I will only say that the 5 remaining stories each convey a different (but similar) message about women. 

One story is about the way women are taught to disappear from society, by losing weight for example (Eight Bites is the story which is about this particular example). Another story is about mental health and women, Machado had difficulty writing this because many people think that a story about a woman and mental health is overdone and is not needed. There is a story about trauma and how women deal with overcoming this or how they should deal with overcoming this. 

Even though not all the stories were easy to read, and I even had times I didn't want to finish the story because I didn't think it was that interesting, I still think every woman should read this book especially the first story (The Husband Stitch), because the messages this book entails are the most important part of the book and the reason I think every woman (and even men) should read these short stories. 

In general, I have given this book 4 stars, which is based on all 8 short stories and I have also given each short story its own rating. 

The Husband Stitch: 5 stars

Inventory: 3 stars

Mothers: 2,5 stars

Especially Heinous: 3 stars

Real Women have Bodies: 4,5 stars

Eight Bites: 4,5 stars

The Resident: 4,5 stars

Difficult at Parties: 4 stars