Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #170311 in Books
• Published on: 2007-02-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 368 pages

Publishing News
`A real one-off'

Financial Times
'This is an entertaining novel that will have fans'

Good Housekeeping
`...a delicate love story'

Customer Reviews

Stranger in a Strange Land
Wonderful book!

You share a journey with the book's narrator, someone who's discovering London, Britain, Europe, Men and herself... Some parts of the journey are extremely funny, some parts are sad, others joyfull! All written from a fresh perspective and very, very readable...

My Chinese fiancee has also read this, loves it and confirms it's very true to the Chinese experience of arriving in London!

And finally, it's not Chick-Lit!

Who are you?
I was very moved by this book - a 'Love Story' for the C21. In principal it is a simple story of a Chinese girl coming to London to learn English.... but as the girl struggles to learn and make herself understood, she increasingly questions the attitudes and values of the English, and in particular her lover, a would-be artist, framer and drop-out. (Not so much culture clash as cultures zooming in opposite directions!) Along the way she begins to examine her own attitudes and values, and her inner conflict over her status as a mere 'lover.' As she masters the language, another frustration grows - the relationship is doomed: the understanding arrives, but the desire does not depart.

This is as much a coming-of-age/loss-of-innocence story as it is about East meeting West; told with startling honesty, wit and insight. It hits out at the nature of love, and comes closer than many of the more 'serious' books.

Don't be put off by the "deliberately bad" English - it adds to the sense of disorientation, but the vocabulary is chosen with precision and intelligence so the meaning becomes clear with very little effort.

Thought-provoking and witty
I was a little put off by the premise of "A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers", as the fact its claim to be written in "deliberately bad English" sounded suspiciously gimmicky to me. I over-rode my apprehensions and bought the book, however - and I'm very glad that I did. This book is well-deserving of its shortlisting for the 2007 Orange Broadband Prize, and while I still think the concept is something of a marketing ploy, it is all the same an integral part of the book, and one which became less noticeable the more of it I read.

Xialou's characterisation of a Chinese girl setting foot out of her country for the first time is pitch-perfect. Zhuang is comic, naive, and eager to learn, and in spite of her lack of academic qualifications, she is a true philosopher. It is so very rare to feel as though one is next to a character, experiencing everything she experiences and watching the London streets through her eyes. I honestly can't remember the last time I've felt so close to a fictional character, as though she were sharing all her secrets with me.

There are moments when I thought that Xiaolu could have afforded to have honed her subtlety a little - for example, a reference to "Walt Whiteman" late in the novel made me wince. There were also times when I felt that Zhuang was becoming a little repetitive. That being said, it wasn't all miss. There are some really beautiful moments of honesty, where Zhuang speaks plainly, breaking back into Mandarin and saying: "I am sick of speaking English like this. I am sick of writing English like this. I feel as if I am being tied up, as if I am living in a prison...the English culture surrounding me becomes enormous. It swallows me, and it rapes me. I am dominated by it." It is simply put and without flourishes - and expresses what she is feeling so well.

Everything considered, it's a beautiful book which manages to be socially relevant without becoming "soap boxy". The language is quietly passionate, the characters are well-crafted, and the story is uncomplicated and thoroughly believable. The comedic touches are expertly placed: Xiaolu often writes with one eyebrow arched ironically in the reader's direction. Certainly pick it up if you ever have the opportunity.