Cecily is desperate to be more than a housewife to a low-level bureaucrat in British-colonised Malaya. A chance meeting with the charismatic General Fujiwara allows her to believe she is doing something bigger than herself and helping to build an ‘Asia for Asians’. Cecily’s espionage helped usher in an even more brutal occupation by the Japanese.
Ten years later in Malaya, 1945, her family is in terrible danger: her 15-year-old son, Abel, has disappeared, and her youngest daughter, Jasmin, is hidden in a basement to prevent her being stolen and put into service at the comfort stations. Her eldest daughter, Jujube, who works at a tea house frequented by drunk Japanese soldiers, becomes angrier by the day.
Cecily knows two things: that this is all her fault; and that her family must never learn the truth.
This is a gripping, devastating and extraordinary book. It is historical fiction at its best, told in subtle ways by the everyday people that suffer during war. Through multiple viewpoints it spans two time frames and reads like a beautiful cinematic film – very vivid but also wonderfully and tragically nuanced.
It tackles the moral complexities of war through many angles and characters, urging the reader to not look away from this violent time in history.
I really enjoyed The Storm We Made. this book. It is a difficult but worthwhile read. Cecily’s torment is brutal to read, as is the childlike views of the young Jasmin and Yuki. An impressive debut novel.
Reviewed by Nicola Skinstad
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Vanessa Chan is the Malaysian author of The Storm We Made, a national bestseller, Good Morning America Book Club Pick and BBC Radio 2 Book Club pick. Acquired by international publishers in a flurry of auctions, the novel, her first, will be published in more than twenty languages worldwide. Her other work has been published in Vogue, Esquire, and more. Vanessa grew up in Malaysia and is now based mostly in Brooklyn.
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