May 01 2023
For some readers, Galsan Tschinag’s description of hard nomadic life in the Altai mountain region of Mongolia’s furthest western reaches in the 1950s will be enough. Der blaue Himmel — which could reasonably be translated as The Blue Sky or Blue Heaven — is a fictionalized memoir of a few years in a boy’s life, …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/05/01/der-blaue-himmel-by-galsan-tschinag/
Mar 19 2023
In Phoenix Extravagant, Yoon Ha Lee transposes the colonial history of Japanese rule in Korea to the Empire of Razan’s conquest of Hwaguk six years before the book’s beginning. Lee uses the framework to tell a story of an artist getting caught up in politics and history, only to discover they had been in it …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/03/19/phoenix-extravagant-by-yoon-ha-lee/
Feb 19 2023
I imagine that Michael Axworthy’s brief for this book ran something like this: Write a one-volume history of Iran, from as early as possible up through as close to the present as is practical. (The hardback edition was published in 2008; the edition that I have was published in 2010 and has an epilogue that …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/02/19/a-history-of-iran-empire-of-the-mind-by-michael-axworthy/
Jan 11 2023
I always really, really want to like Cassandra Khaw’s work more than I do. Ngl, this desire is due in large part to the Malaysian connection, which is enforced in spades by the fact that the entire cast of this book is Malaysian as well! Our five friends — after a fashion — converge on …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/01/11/nothing-but-blackened-teeth-by-cassandra-khaw/
Oct 22 2022
“How would the history of international relations in ‘the East’ be written,” asks Ayşe Zarakol, “if we did not always read the ending — the rise of the West and the decline of the East — into the past?” (frontispiece) Before the West: The Rise and Fall of Eastern World Orders is her effort to …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/10/22/before-the-west-by-ayse-zarakol/
Sep 25 2022
Considering a book of scholarly articles about the history Chinese international relations, I wrote that it was “chock full of implied stories” and looked forward to the day that I could read some of them. Shelley Parker-Chan chose a later inflection point from Chinese history to tell the story of She Who Became the Sun, …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/09/25/she-who-became-the-sun-by-shelley-parker-chan/
Apr 21 2022
Trina Low was the Queen Of The Tiles, the glamorous and hyper-competitive Scrabble champion who died abruptly and unexpectedly towards the end of a championship match when she was only 16. Her death scarred the lives of many of those around her, foremost among them being Najwa Bakri, her best friend and the girl determined …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2022/04/21/queen-of-the-tiles-by-hanna-alkaf/
Dec 03 2021
Y’all, I did not expect this book to make me cry but it sure did. Ash Tan is a young Singaporean girl stressed out from having the National Exams looming over next year’s horizon, particularly since she isn’t very good at math. When she gets her latest bad grade, her mom takes away her handphone …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/12/03/amazing-ash-superhero-ah-ma-by-melanie-lee-and-arif-rafhan/
Nov 24 2021
Hey, everyone, my very talented friend Arif Rafhan has illustrated a(nother) terrific book! The Last Jews Of Penang is a slight volume suitable for all ages, that highlights a little known corner of Malaysian and Jewish history. A small but thriving Jewish settlement existed on the island of Penang for well over a century, building …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/11/24/the-last-jews-of-penang-by-zayn-gregory-arif-rafhan/
Oct 12 2021
I was exceedingly tickled when my older twin, 7 year-old Joseph, came rushing home from school to show me the two library books he’d picked out. One (which I’ll hopefully get to review later) is about a trumpet player like his older brother. The other was this terrific picture book about one of our favorite …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2021/10/12/magic-ramen-the-story-of-momofuku-ando-by-andrea-wang-kana-urbanowicz/
Al Singh
Doug Merrill
Doreen Sheridan
John Pitzel
Lars N. Goldschlager
Laura Eilers
Professor X
Robert Maedgen
Sylvere Ap Leanan
The Shire