June 1st, 2021
Over the weekend, I read Bestiary, decorated poet K-Ming Chang's first novel. The story spans three generations of Taiwanese-American women who trip and dig and struggle through life in the best way they know how. The book is so grounded in the ugly and visceral nature of humanity while infusing itself with folklore and mysticism that affixes itself to the realities of each chracter.
Given Ming's repertoire, unsurprisingly, the novel is poetic, vivid and lamenting, an ode to the terrible beauty of women forging a new life, a new path. I found myself reading certain phrases and lines two or three more times, just to get past the mysterious fog that seemed to enshroud the whole novel. It's a testament to the things a woman must do to survive.
True to its name, Bestiary serves the unhinged and feral entrails of the Asian-American female experience to us on a dirtied platter, blood and fluids and all.
4/5 holes dug in the backyard