Do Not Say We Have Nothing
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4.4 • 112 Ratings
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER • WINNER OF THE GOVERNOR GENERAL'S LITERARY AWARD • FINALIST FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE • SHORTLISTED FOR THE BAILEYS WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION • LONGLISTED FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE IN FICTION • SHORTLISTED FOR THE CANADIAN AUTHORS ASSOCIATION AWARD FOR FICTION • SHORTLISTED FOR THE RATHBONES FOLIO PRIZE
Do Not Say We Have Nothing is a breathtaking novel that tells the story of three musicians in China before, during and after the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. With the ease and skill of a master storyteller, Thien takes us inside an extended family in China, showing us the lives of two successive generations--those who lived through Mao's Cultural Revolution in the mid-twentieth century; and the children of the survivors, who became the students protesting in Tiananmen Square in 1989, in one of the most important political moments of the past century.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
An iBooks Best of 2016 pick. With stirring prose, novelist Madeleine Thien delivers a clear-eyed examination of the link between historical and personal trauma. Marie Jiang is a thirtysomething math whiz in contemporary Vancouver. Her dad is an absent presence: estranged throughout her childhood, he committed suicide in Hong Kong in 1989. His death coincided with the arrival of Ai Ming, the daughter of a family friend, who escaped to Canada after the Tiananmen Square massacre. The novel—winner of the 2016 Governor General's Literary Award—follows the two women as they use journals to reconstruct the stories and paternal grief that bind them.
Customer Reviews
Do Not Say We Have Nothing
Excellent; very interesting story about China, holds your interest throughput
A masterwork!
A brilliant, shining read. One that will make you remember Tiananmen Square and how you should have paid more attention, one that will make you want to listen to Bach and Prokofiev again. Lyrical, emotional and beautiful.
Disappointing
Shortlisted “The Man Booker Prize 2016”. Scotiabank Giller Prize winner. Governor General’s Literary awards winner... what a hype. I had to read it.
This book started so well. It had all the signs of a terrific epic and that it was going to be a very emotional journey. At least that was what I was expecting.
Unfortunately I found the structure hard to follow and I was totally disconnected with the characters (all of them), the whole time. There was no dynamic between them, not even between Sparrow and Kai (and I had big hopes for these two).
I had to go back several times to see if I had missed something because most of the time I did not know where I was in terms of time and place or who was talking. Not once I was touched by the horrible and violent events, not because it was not well described, but because it felt too absurd to grasp, even though those things really happened (we are talking about crucial times in China: the cultural revolution, the Mao’s regime and the massacre at Tiananmen Square). Anyways, I really wanted to like this book. Unfortunately it did not work for me.