- Paperback: 320 pages
- Publisher: Gerald Duckworth & Co Ltd (26 Aug 2010)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0715638998
- ISBN-13: 978-0715638996
- Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 13 x 2 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,112,523 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Repeat After Me
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Product Description
Review
'A tender story of manic love and loss, this is a heartbreaking and uplifting novel with memorably off-kilter leads' --Publishers Weekly
'Cultures don't so much collide as coalesce in DeWoskin's sparkling debut novel... infusing her multicultural narrative with vibrant observations that glitter with laser-intense acuity, she demonstrates a smart, sophisticated literary agility' --Booklist (starred review)
'Cultures don't so much collide as coalesce in DeWoskin's sparkling debut novel... infusing her multicultural narrative with vibrant observations that glitter with laser-intense acuity, she demonstrates a smart, sophisticated literary agility' --Booklist (starred review)
'Cultures don't so much collide as coalesce in DeWoskin's sparkling debut novel... infusing her multicultural narrative with vibrant observations that glitter with laser-intense acuity, she demonstrates a smart, sophisticated literary agility' --Booklist (starred review)
'Cultures don't so much collide as coalesce in DeWoskin's sparkling debut novel... infusing her multicultural narrative with vibrant observations that glitter with laser-intense acuity, she demonstrates a smart, sophisticated literary agility' --Booklist (starred review)
Product Description
Aysha, a twenty-two-year-old New Yorker, is beginning to put the pieces of her life back in place after a nervous breakdown. Teaching an adult education class, she meets a young Chinese student named Da Ge - tortured, charismatic and just as unstable as she is - who flips her world upside-down once again. In a love story that spans decades and continents, from the Tiananmen Square massacre to 9/11, New York City's Upper West Side to the terraced mountains of South China, 'Repeat After Me' is a perceptive, funny and tragic tale of clashing cultures and troubled histories.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
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It's hard to write a review that does this book justice. The premise of Repeat After Me (and indeed the title) sounds so irritatingly predictable - girl recovering from a nervous breakdown falls in love with a student while she's teaching English as a foreign language - and yet this novel is far more than that. Delicately drawn, it pulls you in and makes you desperate to find out what happens next. It made me laugh out loud on a train, gave me goosebumps, and brought tears to my eyes (all at different times of course!).
Twenty-two year old Aysha Silvermintz teaches English as a foreigh language. She's recovering from a nervous breakdown and obsessively counts the number of letters in phrases, hoping it will give her a clue to whether they're true or not. Blaming herself for her parents' divorce, Aysha lives on the fine line between sanity and madness. She's an incredibly appealing narrator, so much so that you can understand the appeal of the mania that eventually causes her to decide to stop taking her medication. Her mental problems are understated and part of the brilliance of this book is how her mental state is so sensitively drawn that it is easy to empathise with and way beyond the cliches of many other representations.
It is around this time that Aysha falls in love with the compelling and potentially dangerous Da Ge, a dissident who left China around the time of the Tiananmen Square massacre. But is this madness, any more than falling is love is usually a bit overwhelming and mad? It's unclear but compelling to watch. The novel charts the course of their confusing romance in translation, interspersed with Da Ge's efforts to write letters in English - the resulting 'Chinglish' is at once funny, endearing and moving.
The story is told in the shape of a letter from Aysha to her daughter, years after the events in this book take place. The narrative shifts between Aysha's present-day life in China with her daughter, and her recollections of the past, when she first met Da Ge in New York. This works very well as a framework for exploring cultural differences: Aysha is both the native New Yorker when she first meets Da Ge, and the immigrant coping with a new life in China.
I loved this book. It was so much better than the lightweight rom-com I was anticipating (and which the back cover blurb leads you to expect). A compelling novel that's easy to read but has great depths. Highly recommended: surprisingly moving, readable and compelling. Never predictable or cliched, and always a good read, this is definitely a book I'll be recommending to my friends.
Twenty-two year old Aysha Silvermintz teaches English as a foreigh language. She's recovering from a nervous breakdown and obsessively counts the number of letters in phrases, hoping it will give her a clue to whether they're true or not. Blaming herself for her parents' divorce, Aysha lives on the fine line between sanity and madness. She's an incredibly appealing narrator, so much so that you can understand the appeal of the mania that eventually causes her to decide to stop taking her medication. Her mental problems are understated and part of the brilliance of this book is how her mental state is so sensitively drawn that it is easy to empathise with and way beyond the cliches of many other representations.
It is around this time that Aysha falls in love with the compelling and potentially dangerous Da Ge, a dissident who left China around the time of the Tiananmen Square massacre. But is this madness, any more than falling is love is usually a bit overwhelming and mad? It's unclear but compelling to watch. The novel charts the course of their confusing romance in translation, interspersed with Da Ge's efforts to write letters in English - the resulting 'Chinglish' is at once funny, endearing and moving.
The story is told in the shape of a letter from Aysha to her daughter, years after the events in this book take place. The narrative shifts between Aysha's present-day life in China with her daughter, and her recollections of the past, when she first met Da Ge in New York. This works very well as a framework for exploring cultural differences: Aysha is both the native New Yorker when she first meets Da Ge, and the immigrant coping with a new life in China.
I loved this book. It was so much better than the lightweight rom-com I was anticipating (and which the back cover blurb leads you to expect). A compelling novel that's easy to read but has great depths. Highly recommended: surprisingly moving, readable and compelling. Never predictable or cliched, and always a good read, this is definitely a book I'll be recommending to my friends.
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
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It's so rare to come across a tender and compelling love story that is not cliched, that finds a fresh way to describe emotion and that is still hugely readable that this book is a complete joy.
The story is written in two interspersed time scales, in two different continents, from the point of view of Aysha who is, at the start, a vulnerable young woman recovering from a breakdown and teaching English to foreign students as a means of reintegrating herself back into society. This makes it sound a bit dull, it isn't! Aysha is a lively and very likeable narrator who I warmed to straight away. When Da Ge, an angry, edgy and undisputably sexy Chinese exile comes into her life, it's clear that what follows is going to be dramatic, exciting, and possibly tragic. There are also some lovely descriptions of how it feels to be a person with limited English, from a completely different cultural background, living in America. Also the fact that the Chinese characters only have a few words to express themselves results in fantastically descriptive, funny and moving passages.
In the second timeframe, Aysha is herself living in China and is the one struggling with the new culture and language. She has a young daughter and the mystery at the heart of the novel is part of what kept me reading to find out how, and why, the two of them had ended up there.
It might put people off if I say this book is almost like reading a long, lovely poem, but the writing is so exquisite it reminded me of Sylvia Plath. The way the author describes relationships, not just romantic ones but between parents and children, old and new friends, is uplifting and fresh. I actually wanted to be part of Aysha's circle of friends they were so well brought to life.
This is without doubt the best book I've read this year. Very highly recommended.
The story is written in two interspersed time scales, in two different continents, from the point of view of Aysha who is, at the start, a vulnerable young woman recovering from a breakdown and teaching English to foreign students as a means of reintegrating herself back into society. This makes it sound a bit dull, it isn't! Aysha is a lively and very likeable narrator who I warmed to straight away. When Da Ge, an angry, edgy and undisputably sexy Chinese exile comes into her life, it's clear that what follows is going to be dramatic, exciting, and possibly tragic. There are also some lovely descriptions of how it feels to be a person with limited English, from a completely different cultural background, living in America. Also the fact that the Chinese characters only have a few words to express themselves results in fantastically descriptive, funny and moving passages.
In the second timeframe, Aysha is herself living in China and is the one struggling with the new culture and language. She has a young daughter and the mystery at the heart of the novel is part of what kept me reading to find out how, and why, the two of them had ended up there.
It might put people off if I say this book is almost like reading a long, lovely poem, but the writing is so exquisite it reminded me of Sylvia Plath. The way the author describes relationships, not just romantic ones but between parents and children, old and new friends, is uplifting and fresh. I actually wanted to be part of Aysha's circle of friends they were so well brought to life.
This is without doubt the best book I've read this year. Very highly recommended.
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
Repeat after me is a fantastic novel in which the main character Aysha Silvermintz recounts a lot of her life in the form of a letter (book) to her daughter.
This book is compellingly written and I found it extremely hard to put down. Something about the way it was written made you just want to sit back and let the story flow over you.
I have read a lot of novels which follow similar theme of mental breakdown which leads to romance but this is somehow different.
One of the best things it portrays are the contrasting views of China and NY. There is something lovely about the way we move seamlessly from one city to another recounting different memories in both.
I also enjoyed reading Da Ge's letters. Da Ge being the man that Aysha essentially falls in love with. His letters written in an authentic form of chinese english - or business english as it is referred to these days were really very interesting and added a lot to the story.
I recommend this book to anyone who just wants to get away for a bit.
It is almost sure to pull you in and make you forget the rest of the world!
This book is compellingly written and I found it extremely hard to put down. Something about the way it was written made you just want to sit back and let the story flow over you.
I have read a lot of novels which follow similar theme of mental breakdown which leads to romance but this is somehow different.
One of the best things it portrays are the contrasting views of China and NY. There is something lovely about the way we move seamlessly from one city to another recounting different memories in both.
I also enjoyed reading Da Ge's letters. Da Ge being the man that Aysha essentially falls in love with. His letters written in an authentic form of chinese english - or business english as it is referred to these days were really very interesting and added a lot to the story.
I recommend this book to anyone who just wants to get away for a bit.
It is almost sure to pull you in and make you forget the rest of the world!
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Quirky but charming love story
After discovering her fathers infidelity, and experiencing the fall out from her parents divorce which leaves her estranged from her father and brother; Aysha suffers a breakdown... Read more
Published 18 months ago by Princess Mononoke
Trying too hard to be different but lovely writing
This book is about a relationship which spans USA and China. It is a first person narrative of an American woman who meets a Chinese man in New York and they fall in love. Read more
Published 18 months ago by Janie U
Unusual book, interesting read
This book is difficult to categorise. On the one hand, it's a 'girl meets boy' story, but on the other, it's much more than that. Read more
Published 18 months ago by Cath B
Sensitive and moving without cloying sentimentality
Aysha, an English as a foreign language teacher, falls for one of her students. Sounds like a pretty hackneyed, predictable scenario, right?
Maybe. Read more
Maybe. Read more
Published 20 months ago by Craig Lam
Heartbroken to death
Rachel DeWoskin's first fictional work after her autobiographical novel-memoir Foreign Babes in Beijing, provides another account of cross-cultural observations mixed with deeply... Read more
Published 21 months ago by Keris Nine
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