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beastreader's review
3.0
Tai witnesses his father beheaded. His father was part of a gang. He was betrayed. The man who betrayed him got away. Tai goes on a mission to get revenge for his family. It will be a life changing journey for Tai.
This is a interesting book. I have mixed feelings about it. On one hand I liked the way Mr. Ha writes. He brought to life Tai. I was cheering for Tai and his mission. He was quiet but had a quiet strength about him. Ever though his father was dead, I felt like I knew him. Just from the tales and memories that Tai had of his father. I agree with the other readers that I liked the poetic writing style that Mr. Ha took with this book. It kept everything flowing together nicely. Mr. Ha really captured the essense of the people that he was writing about.
The flaw that I had with this book and it is minor but I felt that there was a lot of detail spent on telling this story. Tai explained everything that he saw or experienced on his journey. After a while I struggled to stay committed to this book. It moved slowly and at times I had to skim sections to make the story move faster. Otherwise for this factor about the slow pace, I had no other real issues with this book.
This is a interesting book. I have mixed feelings about it. On one hand I liked the way Mr. Ha writes. He brought to life Tai. I was cheering for Tai and his mission. He was quiet but had a quiet strength about him. Ever though his father was dead, I felt like I knew him. Just from the tales and memories that Tai had of his father. I agree with the other readers that I liked the poetic writing style that Mr. Ha took with this book. It kept everything flowing together nicely. Mr. Ha really captured the essense of the people that he was writing about.
The flaw that I had with this book and it is minor but I felt that there was a lot of detail spent on telling this story. Tai explained everything that he saw or experienced on his journey. After a while I struggled to stay committed to this book. It moved slowly and at times I had to skim sections to make the story move faster. Otherwise for this factor about the slow pace, I had no other real issues with this book.
angela_amman's review
3.0
Flesh, by Khanh Ha, takes place in Tonkin (now Vietnam) and follows Tai from the day he watches his father, a bandit from the Lau village, beheaded for his role in the attack on the rival village of Chung. Secrecy, betrayal, debt and obligation follow Tai as he works on a boat and then as a errand boy and assistant to two powerful men in the city of Hanoi.
Reading Flesh is like stepping back in time and settling in as a fly on the wall of Tai’s life. Understated emotion and beautifully rendered details make the story a calm read, despite several instances of violence. Readers expecting an action story filled with executions and opium dens should look elsewhere, but Flesh offers a glimpse of Tonkin life that will leave an impression on your memory.
My entire review can be found at Flesh - A Review.
[b:Flesh|13556446|Flesh|Khanh Ha|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1342400649s/13556446.jpg|19127730]
[a:Khanh Ha|3059216|Khanh Ha|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1342443731p2/3059216.jpg]
Reading Flesh is like stepping back in time and settling in as a fly on the wall of Tai’s life. Understated emotion and beautifully rendered details make the story a calm read, despite several instances of violence. Readers expecting an action story filled with executions and opium dens should look elsewhere, but Flesh offers a glimpse of Tonkin life that will leave an impression on your memory.
My entire review can be found at Flesh - A Review.
[b:Flesh|13556446|Flesh|Khanh Ha|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1342400649s/13556446.jpg|19127730]
[a:Khanh Ha|3059216|Khanh Ha|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1342443731p2/3059216.jpg]
drey72's review
3.0
Khanh Ha’s Flesh starts off gory – with a beheading. Following closely on its heels is a smallpox plague, and more death. Tai is only a boy when he witnesses the first and survives the second. Told in a spare yet emotional voice, Flesh then takes us along as Tai grows up and does everything he can to make sure his father’s death is avenged and both father and brother are buried well.
This is a poor Vietnam, and its people do whatever they can to survive, including Tai. Along his journey, he recovers his father’s skull, packs opium pipes for his employers, meets a girl, and finds out that he really didn’t know his father as much as he thought. He does more than he thinks he can, less than he sometimes should, and is generally a young man growing into the world around him.
Read Flesh to lose yourself in a vividly-described colonial Vietnam, with its poverty and hopelessness, its people’s industrious nature at work to better their lives and the lives of those dear to them, all wrapped up in beautiful prose.
drey’s rating: Pick it up!
This is a poor Vietnam, and its people do whatever they can to survive, including Tai. Along his journey, he recovers his father’s skull, packs opium pipes for his employers, meets a girl, and finds out that he really didn’t know his father as much as he thought. He does more than he thinks he can, less than he sometimes should, and is generally a young man growing into the world around him.
Read Flesh to lose yourself in a vividly-described colonial Vietnam, with its poverty and hopelessness, its people’s industrious nature at work to better their lives and the lives of those dear to them, all wrapped up in beautiful prose.
drey’s rating: Pick it up!
b00kr3vi3ws's review
5.0
I took the longest time to read this book. While I finish a book in a day or two at the most, I read this one over a period of a week. No, not because it was boring, not because it was dragging and certainly not because it was easy to put down. The only reason I forced myself to put down this book after every few chapters is because I did not want it to end! Seriously, it is that good.
The story is that of and narrated by a teenage Vietnamese boy, Tai. Even though he did not share a particularly close relationship with his father, witnessing the beheading of his father makes a great impression on him. He decides to reunite his father’s head with the rest of the body. With that decision, Tai’s life takes a turn that changes him and his life completely. Revenge, redemption, peace and love – these become an integral part of his life – his driving force. What happens when Tai meets a geomancer and leaves his village behind to go work for that man, is for you to read and find out.
The characters are strong and colourful. Tai, the protagonist is someone you are forced to feel for and with. Also, the female characters in the book, especially the ones that touch Tai’s life directly, are really strong and are the ones that you cannot ignore. The dynamics of different relationships are bound to be different and the author has portrayed that very well through these different characters. The author has also managed to cover and describe quite a bit of 19th-20th Century Vietnamese culture and background.
The plot is good and though not very fast paced, it will never give you the ‘drag’ feeling. But I can guarantee you that it will make you think – even days after you have finished reading it. There’s certain ‘darkness’ (for lack of a better word for it in my limited vocabulary) in it that will creep up, get a hold on you and not let go easily. And yes there’s violence that will gross you out. But there’s also love and romance. Then there is hope and forgiveness. The author has expertly dealt with both the spiritual aspects and the emotional and materialistic side of human.
The best feature of this book is the author’s style of writing. I don’t know – this mind sound odd to you, but I thought that his style of writing was very elegant – not any other word, but elegant. It may be because the word elegance usually paints a ‘royal & sophisticated’ picture in my mind and that is exactly what I felt about Khanh Ha’s writing. There’s a certain charm in it that’s more at home with what we call ‘classics’ and hard to come by in modern literature. It is so expressive and touching all the while maintaining its charm. While I was reading, the smooth flow of the storyline naturally complimented his language to paint a very vivid motion picture in my mind.
This book has made a real good impression, one that’s going to last a long time, on me. I would suggest and recommend this book to the people who are looking for a book with good language, great plot, amazing characters and some ‘depth’.
The story is that of and narrated by a teenage Vietnamese boy, Tai. Even though he did not share a particularly close relationship with his father, witnessing the beheading of his father makes a great impression on him. He decides to reunite his father’s head with the rest of the body. With that decision, Tai’s life takes a turn that changes him and his life completely. Revenge, redemption, peace and love – these become an integral part of his life – his driving force. What happens when Tai meets a geomancer and leaves his village behind to go work for that man, is for you to read and find out.
The characters are strong and colourful. Tai, the protagonist is someone you are forced to feel for and with. Also, the female characters in the book, especially the ones that touch Tai’s life directly, are really strong and are the ones that you cannot ignore. The dynamics of different relationships are bound to be different and the author has portrayed that very well through these different characters. The author has also managed to cover and describe quite a bit of 19th-20th Century Vietnamese culture and background.
The plot is good and though not very fast paced, it will never give you the ‘drag’ feeling. But I can guarantee you that it will make you think – even days after you have finished reading it. There’s certain ‘darkness’ (for lack of a better word for it in my limited vocabulary) in it that will creep up, get a hold on you and not let go easily. And yes there’s violence that will gross you out. But there’s also love and romance. Then there is hope and forgiveness. The author has expertly dealt with both the spiritual aspects and the emotional and materialistic side of human.
The best feature of this book is the author’s style of writing. I don’t know – this mind sound odd to you, but I thought that his style of writing was very elegant – not any other word, but elegant. It may be because the word elegance usually paints a ‘royal & sophisticated’ picture in my mind and that is exactly what I felt about Khanh Ha’s writing. There’s a certain charm in it that’s more at home with what we call ‘classics’ and hard to come by in modern literature. It is so expressive and touching all the while maintaining its charm. While I was reading, the smooth flow of the storyline naturally complimented his language to paint a very vivid motion picture in my mind.
This book has made a real good impression, one that’s going to last a long time, on me. I would suggest and recommend this book to the people who are looking for a book with good language, great plot, amazing characters and some ‘depth’.
serenaac's review
4.0
Flesh by Khanh Ha is dark and dreamlike. Tai’s coming of age story is fraught with trauma and hardship, but he maintains his determination and remains grounded despite the beheading of his father at the hands of his granduncle in Northern Vietnam. Ha has woven a dark love story within Tai’s trip through adolescence that takes him to Hanoi and other places as he searches for the man who turned in his bandit father to the authorities. Part dark adventure, Tai is thrown into the world of Vietnam’s opium dens and indentured servitude as his mother barters him away to pay for a safe, final resting place for his father and younger brother.
Read the full review: http://savvyverseandwit.com/2012/06/flesh-by-khanh-ha.html
Read the full review: http://savvyverseandwit.com/2012/06/flesh-by-khanh-ha.html
buttontapper's review
5.0
Khanh Ha’s novel, Flesh, is an unusual, complicated story of human frailties and desires. Set in 19th century Vietnam, the book opens with a vivid (some might even say gruesome) description of the public beheading of the narrator’s father--a common thief. The boy, Tài, watches as each of the members of his father’s gang are summarily executed, and though Tài himself admits he was never close to his father, the scene has lasting consequences.
Miraculously surviving a smallpox outbreak, which claims his younger brother, Tài becomes determined to reunite his father’s head with the rest of his body. Though his mother has been allowed to bury the headless corpse in her backyard (as per common custom at that time), Tài’s father’s head is placed on a pike outside the city as a warning to other would-be thieves. How can he reclaim it without further offending the citizens whom his father has robbed? Furthermore, why bother attending to this task for a father that has never done right by his family? Tài wants to settle the score, avenging his father’s death by killing the man who ratted him out, but also by allowing his father’s and brother’s spirits to rest once their bones have been properly settled.
As Tài pursues his quest, he is aided by his employer, Chim, and Chim’s daughter Xoan. Chim provides ferryboat service on the river, and picks up a geomancer--a man who scouts out auspicious burial plots for the wealthy. Tài realizes that this man can help him find a better resting place for both his father and brother, and tells his mother of his plan. She makes a deal with the geomancer, sending Tài to work for him as payment for the burial plot.
And then... well, you’ll have to read the rest of the book to find out just what happens when you trust a geomancer with your life and death!
This historic fictional tale is a sweeping saga of family loyalties, religious and mystical beliefs, and the normal daily struggles of average people in 19th century Vietnam. Divided into chapters with titles like “The Demonic Opium Pipe” and “The Silk Woman,” Ha vividly paints scenes and characters with fine, careful brushstrokes, nudging his narrator forward from revenge-obsessed child to world-weary man. The story emerges gradually as from a mist—or perhaps a cloud of opium—with these tales told by an old man looking back on his life’s journey. Who is Tài, really, and how did he get to where he is today--an old man with a shiny skull and a pocket watch with a black-and-white photograph of a woman as the defining talismans of his personal history?
Is the desire for revenge enough to define or sustain a life? What happens when a child loses his father at a young age? Does even a common thief deserve forgiveness? Where do our ancestors go after they die, and can they help us to carry out our own individual destinies? Flesh offers readers a chance to explore these questions through a very human tale, sprinkled with ancient customs and superstitions as well as deeply-held religious beliefs both Asian and European.
This is an excellent Halloween selection for its dark themes, haunting spirits and gritty portrayal of life in Northern Vietnam.
(This review was originally posted at Black Heart Magazine, and a complimentary review copy was provided by Novel Publicity.)
Miraculously surviving a smallpox outbreak, which claims his younger brother, Tài becomes determined to reunite his father’s head with the rest of his body. Though his mother has been allowed to bury the headless corpse in her backyard (as per common custom at that time), Tài’s father’s head is placed on a pike outside the city as a warning to other would-be thieves. How can he reclaim it without further offending the citizens whom his father has robbed? Furthermore, why bother attending to this task for a father that has never done right by his family? Tài wants to settle the score, avenging his father’s death by killing the man who ratted him out, but also by allowing his father’s and brother’s spirits to rest once their bones have been properly settled.
As Tài pursues his quest, he is aided by his employer, Chim, and Chim’s daughter Xoan. Chim provides ferryboat service on the river, and picks up a geomancer--a man who scouts out auspicious burial plots for the wealthy. Tài realizes that this man can help him find a better resting place for both his father and brother, and tells his mother of his plan. She makes a deal with the geomancer, sending Tài to work for him as payment for the burial plot.
And then... well, you’ll have to read the rest of the book to find out just what happens when you trust a geomancer with your life and death!
This historic fictional tale is a sweeping saga of family loyalties, religious and mystical beliefs, and the normal daily struggles of average people in 19th century Vietnam. Divided into chapters with titles like “The Demonic Opium Pipe” and “The Silk Woman,” Ha vividly paints scenes and characters with fine, careful brushstrokes, nudging his narrator forward from revenge-obsessed child to world-weary man. The story emerges gradually as from a mist—or perhaps a cloud of opium—with these tales told by an old man looking back on his life’s journey. Who is Tài, really, and how did he get to where he is today--an old man with a shiny skull and a pocket watch with a black-and-white photograph of a woman as the defining talismans of his personal history?
Is the desire for revenge enough to define or sustain a life? What happens when a child loses his father at a young age? Does even a common thief deserve forgiveness? Where do our ancestors go after they die, and can they help us to carry out our own individual destinies? Flesh offers readers a chance to explore these questions through a very human tale, sprinkled with ancient customs and superstitions as well as deeply-held religious beliefs both Asian and European.
This is an excellent Halloween selection for its dark themes, haunting spirits and gritty portrayal of life in Northern Vietnam.
(This review was originally posted at Black Heart Magazine, and a complimentary review copy was provided by Novel Publicity.)
ctorretta's review
4.0
Straight off the bat we have a guy talking about a skull, polishing this skull even and as he tells you a little bit about this skull you begin to get intrigued. Page 13 we start to get more into the story and see this man’s father getting his head cut off. Page 13!!! The intrigue doesn’t stop there, one thing after another and you know you as well as the characters in this story are going to be in for something big! Might as well get settled down now.
The plot is really good, as you read above. Something is always going on with the main character and it’s really amazing that this guy lives to tell his story. From large things like getting small pox to such things as running into a group of kids that thing his father’s skull is theirs or hitting a guy on the back of his head with a rock when he thinks it’s the right thing to do.
The characters are just as interesting as the story. The main character and narrator Tai, is the most interesting as of course we are reading about him but he doesn’t shy away from telling us his most base instincts and feelings. He is a remarkable person and makes you want to know more about him and why he wants revenge for his father’s death. He meets so many people along the way and you never really know who is there to hurt or help him.
This is also written during a time of harsh living. As if Tai’s life issues aren’t enough the issues of his environment would bring anyone down. His spirit is what brings him up time and time again and it’s remarkable to see!
I definitely recommend this book, especially if you enjoy historical fiction but also if you enjoy reading about different cultures. The author did a fascinating job and my favorite of all is the use of his writing. It’s nearly lyrical, beautiful and haunting.
The plot is really good, as you read above. Something is always going on with the main character and it’s really amazing that this guy lives to tell his story. From large things like getting small pox to such things as running into a group of kids that thing his father’s skull is theirs or hitting a guy on the back of his head with a rock when he thinks it’s the right thing to do.
The characters are just as interesting as the story. The main character and narrator Tai, is the most interesting as of course we are reading about him but he doesn’t shy away from telling us his most base instincts and feelings. He is a remarkable person and makes you want to know more about him and why he wants revenge for his father’s death. He meets so many people along the way and you never really know who is there to hurt or help him.
This is also written during a time of harsh living. As if Tai’s life issues aren’t enough the issues of his environment would bring anyone down. His spirit is what brings him up time and time again and it’s remarkable to see!
I definitely recommend this book, especially if you enjoy historical fiction but also if you enjoy reading about different cultures. The author did a fascinating job and my favorite of all is the use of his writing. It’s nearly lyrical, beautiful and haunting.
truebookaddict's review
4.0
Flesh is quite a work of historical fiction. I know very little about Vietnam and its history. I basically have a limited knowledge of the war in Vietnam and that's about it. Khanh Ha has really brought turn of the century Annam (now Vietnam) to life. Tai's story is shocking and poignant. To see your father beheaded for the crimes he committed would be such a traumatic experience. What we learn early on is that honor is very important in Tai's culture and he is on a quest to find his father's skull and the man who betrayed his father in order to honor him. It's quite a journey.
I've noticed that others have remarked of the dark, dream-like, or moody quality of Ha's writing. What I liked the most was his use of rich historical detail to tell what really is a great story. This is my first foray into Asian literature (long overdue) and I am very pleased. I look forward to future works by Mr. Ha. Definitely give this one a read, dear readers.
I've noticed that others have remarked of the dark, dream-like, or moody quality of Ha's writing. What I liked the most was his use of rich historical detail to tell what really is a great story. This is my first foray into Asian literature (long overdue) and I am very pleased. I look forward to future works by Mr. Ha. Definitely give this one a read, dear readers.
abookishaffair's review against another edition
4.0
The topic of "Flesh" is a hard one to get through. Tai is young but he knows that needs to revenge his father's death even though he didn't ever really have a chance to get to know him well. This guy has more courage packed into one person. I know that if I had been in his position, I would not have been nearly that brave.
Although I loved the historical setting of the book (more on that later), I was really gripped by Ha's writing in this book. Tai's story certainly has a lot of gravitas on it's own but Ha's writing makes the story really come to life. There are those books out there where after reading the first couple pages, you know you are going to fall very hard for the style of the writing. "Flesh" was very much that way for me. In a lot of places, the writing is beautiful and almost poetic! The subject matter may not sit well with everyone (some parts of the book are quite brutal and raw) but the writing turns this book into something really special.
Set in the late 1800s in Tonkin (which is now Vietnam), the setting and time period of this book will definitely appeal to historical fiction readers that prefer their book settings a little more off of the beaten path. We get to see what Tai's village is like as well as what some of the other villages are like. Ha's descriptions in the book are really great.
Bottom line: This is a great historical fiction with difficult subject matter but it's one that those who want good detail and good writing will enjoy!
Although I loved the historical setting of the book (more on that later), I was really gripped by Ha's writing in this book. Tai's story certainly has a lot of gravitas on it's own but Ha's writing makes the story really come to life. There are those books out there where after reading the first couple pages, you know you are going to fall very hard for the style of the writing. "Flesh" was very much that way for me. In a lot of places, the writing is beautiful and almost poetic! The subject matter may not sit well with everyone (some parts of the book are quite brutal and raw) but the writing turns this book into something really special.
Set in the late 1800s in Tonkin (which is now Vietnam), the setting and time period of this book will definitely appeal to historical fiction readers that prefer their book settings a little more off of the beaten path. We get to see what Tai's village is like as well as what some of the other villages are like. Ha's descriptions in the book are really great.
Bottom line: This is a great historical fiction with difficult subject matter but it's one that those who want good detail and good writing will enjoy!
reallifereading's review against another edition
Flesh opens daringly with a beheading. It is Hanoi, 1896, and a young boy watches as his father, a bandit, is executed.
Life in the almost-twentieth century Annam (Vietnam today) was ugly, beheadings aside. And that is where author Khanh Ha shines – bringing to the page all those pungent odours, the grisly details of the every day, the revolting traditional ‘cures’ for smallpox, and the brown, the brown, the brown of village life:
“The color of the land must have been dyed into their souls before they were even born. One must blend with the earth, the soil that gives one crops each year.”
But we soon move onto the dark ugliness of the city of Hanoi, where young Tai is to work for a geomancer in exchange for a ‘lucky’ burial plot for his father, and where he meets Xiaoli, a Chinese girl who works in an opium den.
In Khanh Ha’s opium den, where only premium opium is smoked, we get a glimpse of silk canopies, peanut-oil lamps, mother-of-pearl etchings on the wooden beds:
“I thought of an ethereal world free of all pain, all worries. I breathed in a dark odor of caramel, and the room came to life with the occasional crackling of pipes”
I’m not sure that I’ve read anything else that has told me what opium smelled like before!
While the descriptions of 20th century Tonkin are lush and fulfilling, I wished that a finer-toothed comb could have weeded out some of the less than efficient conversations, and teased out the plot a little better. As a result, my reading of this book was very meandering – pick it up, put it down, panic that the tour stop is coming up. Didn’t help that Song of Achilles was distracting me at the same time.