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The 5th Wave
14
The Light Between Oceans: A Novel
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Fieldwork: A Novel
This book started out with a lot of promise. An American anthropologist, Martiya van der Leun, living in a remote Thai village, is tried for murder of a young Christian missionary. The narrator of this story, Mischa Berlinski (who names their main characters after themselves?), is an American ex-pat living in Thailand as a freelance writer. When he hears about Martiya's story, she has been in prison for several years and has recently committed suicide. Armed with some notes from her journal, Mischa becomes obsessed with this story in trying to find a motive or explanation for her crime. I picked up this book since I will be vacationing in Thailand and wanted to read a novel that gave me some insight to the country. This book definitely conveys the impression of the happy-go-lucky nature of the Thai people as well as the diversity of the population, especially in some of the remote rural areas. But, the story of this book took a lot of bizarre turns. There is way too much background on both Martiya and the Christian missionary. Adding stories about how each of their grandparents' met is not only unnecessary but detracts from the overall plot. There were long descriptions of how the missionary leaves Thailand and spends years following the Grateful Dead. Is Jerry Garcia relevant to this book? The problem with so many diversions is that when the ending is revealed, it seems anti-climatic. Readers look to find those threads that tie everything neatly together. Instead I was left with a disappointing feeling of 'is that all?'
