Young Adult Fiction: The Astonishing Color of After by Emily X.R. Pan

Yet another book has made it onto this blog due to the joint efforts of Goodreads and Half Price Books. The Astonishing Color of After by Emily X.R. Pan is one of those books with a cover that makes you take a closer look, a title that draws you in, and then you read the synopsis and find yourself needing to know more.

The Situation: It is the summer after sophomore year, and Leigh has finally kissed her best friend, Axel, something she has wanted to do for years. It is of course a moment that will change everything, but it is around the same time that Leigh's mother decided to end her own life. Dory had struggled with depression longer than Leigh had known about her feelings for Axel, and after years of therapy and medication, it all finally became too much. Now Leigh and her father Brian will struggle to keep themselves together, something they were already having difficulty doing. And then Leigh decides to make things even harder by requesting to meet the Taiwanese grandparents she's never seen. She is convinced it is what Dory wants her to do. But Leigh is also convinced that her mother has transformed into a bird.

The Problem: Relations had been strained between Dory and her parents ever since she insisted on moving to the U.S. and marrying a man who is not Chinese or Taiwanese. So when Leigh and her father show up at her Waigong and Waipo's house in Taiwan, they are happy to see her, but a brief and intense argument with her father causes him to leave. Now Leigh is in Taiwan, staying with people she only just met, who speak a language she does not understand, while attempting to track down a bird she believes is her mother, as her most important friendship unravels back home. Leigh does her best to piece together the clues her mother left behind, one of which is a half-finished suicide note with most of the lines crossed out, while holding onto her own sanity. And memories come to her that often confuse more than clarify. Leigh understands there is no rushing through grief, but she hopes to find answers before it is too late.

Genre, Themes, History: This is a young adult novel set in present day, but alternating between the past and future, the U.S. and Taiwan. Starting at the beginning of the summer after her sophomore year of high school, and the day her mother committed suicide, Leigh tells her story of heartache and grief, and the slow journey she had to take through it all in the hopes of finding out what her mother wanted her to know. As she spends the summer in Taiwan with the grandparents she does not know, Leigh slowly learns more and more about her mother, her parents' relationship, her Taiwanese family and their culture, and even about herself and what she really feels about what is happening with Axel. Blending reality with magic and fantasy, Leigh's journey is filled with painful memories that are not all her own; ornaments and photographs from the past that trigger them; the colors that she and Axel make up and assign to everything; and a giant red bird that clearly has a message it wants to deliver. The novel deals with depression, suicide, the difficulty of family, the difficulty of being a teenager, what it means to be biracial not only in the U.S, but also Asia, and even art and colors, and their relationship to music.

My Verdict: For the most part, this is an interesting premise with decent follow-through. With the time-hopping back and forth, things never get confusing or muddled, and thankfully, there are no glaring loose ends once everything is said and done. But for some reason, I feel like it did not need to be as long as it was. There is certainly a lot going on, with Leigh looking into her mother's past, navigating a summer with Taiwanese grandparents, and reflecting on her own history with Axel. Even so, I found myself dealing with something that often comes up when a novel has more than one plot point. There is almost always going to be one plot point that is far more interesting that the others, or one that is not as engaging as the others. I wanted all of the questions to be answered, but I was not so interested in the actual investigation. And once the answers are found, a significant amount of suspension of disbelief must be applied. I understand that is usually necessary when elements of fantasy are involved, but the author asks the readers to ignore various clues that do not at all line up with some of Leigh's conclusions. All things considered, it is still a good book that explores grief, regret, depression, family, and the importance of color.

Favorite Moment: There is a lot of talk about food and colors in this book, and it always added to the overall story and experience.

Favorite Character: Leigh's friend Caro is forthright, honest, and is not interested in dancing around things. She is basically the type of friend Leigh and Axel pretend to be to each other.    

Favorite Quote: "It's okay to be afraid. But not okay if be afraid means you do nothing. You must not do nothing. That's not life worth living." - Dory on fear after Leigh denies being afraid to go for an amazing opportunity.   

Recommended Reading: Both the title and the cover reminded me of The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton, even though the plots are completely different; however, they do both use magical realism to paint a beautiful story.