Though I really enjoy reading The Joy Luck Club, I always come out of it feeling somewhat disappointed. The whole book is about mothers and daughers understanding each other and reconciling and learning about each other. Ying-ying teaches her daughter Lena to be a tiger instead of just taking what other people give her. Lindo and Waverly learn that no every comment is meant to wound. An-mei tries to teach her daughter Rose to fight for things instead of just letting them go.
But the fourth mother-daughter pairing, Suyuan and Jing-mei, you never get a reconciliation because Tan used Suyuan’s death as a catalyst for the plot. While Jing-mei learns to understand what motivated her mother, we never get that moment of reconciliation. It’s just too late for them. Because of this, the book feels unbalanced and a little incomplete to me.
Still, this is a really well written book. If you cry during stories about families, this one will make you cry.
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I noticed this when I was reading The Book Standard this morning. Ann Coulter must be stopped!
Hi,The lack of reconciliation or closure with the mother was sad, but the daughter was able to reconcile with the lost twins, something her mother was unable to do. I thought that was a partial compensation. I felt the ending was more real for the lack of closure.