I started and finished A Sense of Direction in one evening; I couldn't really stop thinking about it, so I couldn't put it down. I found it...
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At first I thought that the group of people who ended up disappearing must be the most clueless group of Americans who ever traveled abroad. Once I learned that the narrator, Bibi Chen, was also a fictional character, and the novel was a fantasy about what happens when a hapless group of Americans, through the best of intentions, but horribly unaware of others and other cultures, wind up lost in Burma/Myannmar - a country too often in the news for the brutality of its political suppression, I appreciated the novel much more. Tan effectively mixes a satirical sense of humor with very touching descriptions of how a repressed people are affected by the actions of a harsh regime.
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Saving Fish from Drowning by Amy Tan
boannextra, November 22, 2009
At first I thought that the group of people who ended up disappearing must be the most clueless group of Americans who ever traveled abroad. Once I learned that the narrator, Bibi Chen, was also a fictional character, and the novel was a fantasy about what happens when a hapless group of Americans, through the best of intentions, but horribly unaware of others and other cultures, wind up lost in Burma/Myannmar - a country too often in the news for the brutality of its political suppression, I appreciated the novel much more. Tan effectively mixes a satirical sense of humor with very touching descriptions of how a repressed people are affected by the actions of a harsh regime.(1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)