3/5 Stars (%66/100)
The Joy Luck Club tells the story from eight perspectives on living a life with both Chinese culture and values and American culture and values. The novel is essentially made of sixteen chapters with each woman getting two chapters each. The novel opens after the death of Suyuan Woo, an elderly Chinese woman and the founding member of the Joy Luck Club. Suyuan has died with regret and an unfulfilled wish. She could not be reunited with her twin daughters who were lost in China. Suyuan’s American-born daughter, Jing-mei Woo, or June, is asked to replace her mother at the Joy Luck Club’s meetings.
The book revolves around this seemingly easy plot. The most important thing in the book is whether the daughters truly know their mothers. The mothers want to raise their children in America in a different way than the daughters who were born in a country with a very different culture. They have their own unique perspectives and expectations in this strange environment. Though they love each other, their perspective and living in a country where they have to use a different language and adapt to this new culture, create problems.
The book is all about looking at life from a unique perspective and how these perspectives affect the relationship between the mothers and their daughters. Since the chapters are devoted to several different women, you get the chance to see the world from their perspective. The mothers see America in a different way and the daughters see America in a completely different way and this is what makes the book interesting in my opinion.
