I am already onto my second read of 2009. Curtis Sittenfeld’s American Wife is proving to be as good as the critics have been claiming over the last few months. I know that the main characters are supposed to be loosely modeled after Laura Bush, President George W. Bush and members of his administration, but so far American Wife is reading like a great novel should. There are OMG! moments and wonderful character development. I’m pretty pleased so far, but I’ll let you know what I think in the end.
In addition to reading American Wife this weekend, I also caught up on some of my magazine reading. I have a subscription to Elle Magazine and in the January issue there is an ARTICLE about Janice Lee and her debut novel, The Piano Teacher, which hits shelves on January 13th. I have been interested in reading this book since I started hearing about it over the last few months on-line. Bloggers, book review sites and on-line book stores have been singing Lee’s praises and the story itself has caught my interest. The Piano Teacher takes place during and after WWII in Hong Kong during the Japanese Occupation.
I vacationed in Hong Kong for five days during the summer of 2007 with a girlfriend of mine who had a business trip there. I loved it so much I am hoping that Hubby and I will get to go before moving back to the States from Okinawa this summer. I am especially hoping to read The Piano Teacher before hand so I can gather some new information about places I was not aware of first time around in Hong Kong. The Elle article claims “If you can’t actually get to Hong Kong, reading The Piano Teacher is the perfect vicarious voyage. If you can, it serves as a wonderful travel guide.” What an exciting way to enjoy both book and city, by personally seeing places written about in the book with my very own eyes!
Planet Books 