This book is pure (sophomoric) colonial masturbation. The prose is an insufferable imitation, somewhere between Ishiguro fanfic and oriental fetishization. The characters, our 1st person POV included, are inhuman alternately overworn, lifeless stock and amorphous author's pawns, equally unbelievable and unsympathetic. Pretentious, sentimental, artificial - there's not a single redeeming quality in this book. This sounds so cliche but maybe this book has more to say about the people/culture who read it than about the people/culture it was written about? I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater just because I don't understand the context it was written in. Approaching an 'instant classic' like this well after its zeitgeist moment may be problematic I suppose. I'm curious if there are any older readers who can share cultural context from when this book was released? I was only 11 at the time and reading it now the book is 16 years old.
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