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Summary: Tan shouldn't have paralleled her book to the Kitchen Gods.
Review: Because the Kitchen God King was not a misogynist. If you read the actual fairy tale there is no hint of abuse on the Kitchen God Queen. The Kitchen King never raped or beated the Kitchen Queen. If you see many illustrations of the Kitchen King and Kitchen Queen in Chinese literature, they are always together. And the Kitchen Queen is honored because she is the Kitchen King's wife. And the Kitchen King is honored because he is the Kitchen Queen's husband. So, Wen Fu doesn't even come close as a comparison to the Kitchen King! Other than that, the only good this novel can do is help strengthen feminist causes (although Tan does it in spite of Chinese culture). But, it won't help Asian causes at all.
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Summary: The Kitchen God's Wife finally got a divorce
Review: Amy Tan is a great storyteller. But she is also great for three other reasons. First she is able to unravel a story from at least two points of view, here a mother and her daughter. Officially it is the story of the mother told to the daughter, but in fact it is the background and underground building of the daughter's personality as a Chinese American : the Chinese side of her self is the inheritance of her mother's experience. Second she deals with women in their liberation, not the liberation of the younger generation, but their liberation as the natural outcome of the hardships and subsequent liberation of their mothers. It is the struggle of the mothers for their freedom that gives freedom to their daughters. In that respect Amy Tan is one of the very best writers on the condition of women in the US. She is at least as good as the Afro-American women writers along that line. Third she is always able to connect the traditional Chinese side of her story, in China itself, with the war against the Japanese and the coming of the Communists, to the modern Chinese American culture. She does not exorcize the Communists, nor the Japanese, though she sounds partial with the Japanese as agressors, though their task was made easy bvy the rotten Kuomintang officials and army. On the other hand she is fair witrh the Communists and shows how they were able to use deep discontent to capture their own victory. It is the case here with women and feudal marriages. The Communists are able to help the women who want to escape this fate knowing that it will start a real revolution in the country and that most women will follow suit. The divide then appears for what it is : a cultural divide, the free choice between serving one's society and serving one's interest, a communal - if not communistic - choice on one side and a personal - if not individualistic - choice on the other side. This leads to a very optimistic note at the end : the two sides are not opposed and can find a new unity, especially now that the kitchen God's wife has finally divorced her godly husband, reducing him to a hellish destiny and enhancing herself into a totally optimistic future for both men and women, for society, through equality.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU
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Summary: We need more of this
Review: It is very interesting that in America, land of immigrants, so little is known about the generations past. Specially when it comes to far east and middle east countries. As our children grow in this melting pot, they are faced with this dilemma of what to be and which way to go. Is my mother an idiot because she has an accent? Is my father no good because he thinks differently? How should I be? Who should I become? If we read these novels we will be able to make a stronger connection to our kids. We can, like Amy tan, tell our stories and give our children our perspectives and let them digest it. Instead of hiding things and trying to assimilate and lose our own identity in the meantime. So Amy if you are reading this, please write some more!
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Summary: A compelling and true-spoken narration
Review: Though it's beginning isn't exactly engrossing - at least not to me, as the main character seemed a married, middle-aged woman with boring family problems - the story really picked up when the woman's mother tells her story of life in China during World War II. It is really a different perspective, for all you who read about wars, and those that don't even like to. It is a story most heartfelt and so very realistic. ...There's something about Amy Tan's style - she doesn't dress up her story, everything is plainly told, and yet the work is just full of details and I find myself reading word-for-word unconsciously. "The Kitchen God's Wife" refers to Winnie (the mother's) life being in the shadow of her corrupt and malicious husband, herself helpless and overlooked. In my opinion, this book is a much better plot than The Joy Luck Club, and has a more dramatic theme. And while it may be long and seemingly tedious, it is worth every word!!
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Summary: i love this book!!
Review: This was on my school reading list and this was not even the book I planned on reading. I wanted to read Joy Luck Club but it wasnt at the library so I picked this up instead. Personally I think this is much better. This is definitely one of my favorite books and I cannot even count how many times I have read this book. If anyone wants a book that is filled with emotion this is definitely a book you would want to read.
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Summary: Poor communication is the greatest tragedy
Review: I enjoyed reading Tan's "The Kitchen God's Wife." Although I am not too familiar with Chinese or even Chinese American culture, I was struck by the universal theme of how heartache wears people down, causing them to shield their feelings and strain even their most precious relationships rather than risk being emotionally open and connected to one another. The story revolves around a Chinese mother and her American born daughter, and the way they've retreated from this relationship to numb the suffering each has experienced...which is definitely the wrong antidote. The book unfolds the life story of Winnie, the mother, who grew up in China in the early 1900's and left for the United States sometime shortly after World War II. I don't like to think the harsh treatment she endured, especially as a child, could be true, although cruelty has never been limited to one time or place. At times it seemed the plot got a little convoluted or perhaps repetitious, but Tan is a skilled storyteller and manages to follow through to a credible ending. Her book makes me curious to know more about Chinese culture--to this end, I enjoyed the historical references and observations of customs as seen through the eyes of her various characters.
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Summary: Same Old Stuff
Review: This book has the same structure and theme as the Joy Luck Club. Read the debut and end it. Amy Tan is obesessed with the melodramatic and maudlin, in the process turning her novels into potboilers read only by illiterate female homemakers. Instead of reading fiction about China, why not go there and see it for yourself?
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Summary: Excellent
Review: This is the first book I have read of Amy Tan's and it is the best book I have read in many years. I was drawn to read her because I saw the movie " The Joy Luck Club" and loved that story. Highly recommend. The characters were easy to become intwined with.
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Summary: Does Tan ever fail?
Review: I read the Joy Luck Club years ago, and to this day it is still one of my favorite books. Both novels were centered around a strained mother-daughter relationship. I started reading this novel because I thought it would have a ton of simalarities, The Kitchen God's Wife has some simalarities but not many. The story is centered around Winnie. Winnie is from China, and now lives in California. She does not have a good relationship with Pearl, her daughter. Pearl has MS, and has not told her mother even though she has had the ailment for a few years. Pearl is struggling with how to eventually tell her mother, and how her mother will take the news. Pearl looks at her mother and does not understand her customs or her way of life. She only sees her mother as annoying but she stills loves her. Auntie Helen is related to Winnie. While the woman lived in China they made a pact not to tell anyone about certain aspects of their lives. They have kept each others secrets for decades, leading all the way back to the beginning of World War II. At that time Winnie was married to a monster named Wen Fu. Auntie Helen tells Winnie she is dying of a brain tumor, and can no longer keep their secrets. Winnie is now forced to tell her daughter all of her secrets, including the secret about Pearl's real father. This story reads like a memoir. It's beautiful description and Tan's gift of developing characters makes everything seem so real. You feel for Winnie, and the difficult choices she had to make. Would she stick with tradion that belittled women in China, or would she find help through progressive ideas? Could she get away from her abusive husband who continually raped, and threatened to kill her? Could she find love, and self worth. All of these questions are asked, and answered in The Kitchen God's Wife. Amy Tan is a gifted writer, and each time I read a novel of hers I continue to love each character and story. Tan writes about the ties that bind all women together. Mother and daughters, sisters and friends. Women have something that binds us that can never be explained. Tan writes about mothers and daughters who have a strained relationship because of the unwillingness to understand one another. As daughters, we tend to forget that our mothers had a life before us. Through their storytelling we can understand the choices they made, and the hardships that our mothers encountered. Daughters can see a little of themselves, and their actions through their mothers. This is what Tan writes about, and this is why I love her novels so much.
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Summary: The Kitchen God's Wife
Review: The Kitchen God's Wife a great first book to read from Amy Tan's wonderful collection of novels. In the book The Kitchen God's Wife, it deals with the relationship between a Chinese mother and her American daughter and the secrets that they keep from each other. The book talks about the mother's life and the things that she had to endure to get to America. In this book there are many stories to be told, not just of a mother daughter relationship, but also of two friends staying with each other till the end, or a story of how a wife struggles to free herself from an abusive husband. Reading the book has helped me to understand more about Chinese traditions and why they are traditions. While reading this book I also learned the story of the kitchen god, and now each year as my family celebrates the kitchen god I remember what his wife did for him and how lucky he is to have such a wonderful wife. The kitchen god's wife, it is just one of those books that you can't put down.
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