Book 6: A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers by Xiaolu Guo

Title: A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers
Author: Xiaolu Guo
Length: 354 pages
Year Written: 2007
Why I chose this book: This was a birthday gift from my friend Yohana, who fittingly just got back from a semester abroad in London.

This book is about a young 20-something Chinese woman who goes to study in London, completely unaccustomed to English attitudes and customs. She speaks very poor English at first, and whole book she write like this. However, through studying her translative dictionary and spending time with her newfound lover who is white and almost twice her age, she strengthens her command of the English language rapidly as the novel progresses.

The woman, who is usually referred to simply as 'Z' (because no one she encounters can pronounce her real Chinese name), quickly becomes enraptured by the lover she has only known for a few weeks, even moving in with him. He eventually encourages her to travel by herself through Europe, where lots of strange and lonely things happen. The most interesting aspect of the book, for me, was imagining myself as Z: traveling foreign lands, meeting various communication barriers, longing for something that doesn't quite come to the anticipated conclusion. The book made me think about the masses of people throughout history, my mother included, who came to a new land and felt their way blindly through. I imagine it to have a potential depth of loneliness that I've not yet experienced in my life, and coming to find a oasis of intimacy in a strange country is probably very important, as Z so poignantly demonstrates.

This book reminds me of Flowers for Algernon or even Push in its diary-like, first-person format complete with the colloquial language of the narrator. It is a sad, beautiful book that stirs up many thoughts of human nature and loneliness.

Rating: 8.8/10