The Tiger's Wife

I still haven't made my mind up about "The Tiger's Wife," and I don't know if my conflicted feelings about the book have more to do with the book itself or how I'm supposed to think about it. Let me explain: I expect many readers would probably say that "The Tiger's Wife" fits pretty comfortably into the genre of "magical realism," that genre that deals with the familiar-yet-fantastic that grew up in the wake of Gabriel García Marquez's "One Hundred Years of Solitude." But that book derived much of its power from the fact that it seemed a natural -- even logical -- extension of Latin American reactions to the modern world. As well written and affecting as it can be, "The Tiger's Wife" reads a lot like a novel written by somebody who's show more read a lot of Marquez, and it suffers for it. Yes, Obreht incorporates a number of Balkan legend and folk belief into the book, and much of it is interesting, but while you could imagine that many of the fantastic happenings in "Hundred Years" might have seemed wholly normal to the inhabitants of Macondo, there's a deliberately artificial fairy-tale quality to much of "The Tiger's Wife," including many of the sections dealing with the tiger itself, that make the whole affair more magical than realist, and therefore more cutesy than cutting. I recently read that Albanian writer Ismail Kadere actually rejects the term "magical realism" for his own work, arguing that his characters' mindsets are essentially premodern and belief in the supernatural is entirely guileless. But since tiger's aren't native to Serbia, it's hard to say how near-illiterate, extremely isolated Serbian peasants would react to the appearance of a tiger in the woods near their town. The book, at times, seems less like an honest account than a bit of literary whimsy.

Which isn't to say that there aren't reasons to recommend "The Tiger's Wife." Obreht writes -- let's admit it -- astonishingly fluidly and beautifully for her years, and the book is strongest when it discusses the elements of the novel she probably had first-hand experience with: NATO's bombing campaign, the confused, divided aftermath of the bloody breakup of Yugoslavia, and how teens reacted to a war that was on everyone's mind but that didn't affect their everyday lives all that much. We hear about late night adventures, bootleg tapes of rock music, and the occasional draft evasion. There's also the author's lovely description of the relationship, both personal and professional, between the main character and her grandfather, a man of great dignity and bearing who negotiates with his own demise as best he can throughout much of the book.

As for the moral implications of the book, I'm also of two minds: the suspicious, gossipy village that the author uses as an allegory of sorts for the book doesn't really do much to address the issue of collective guilt that's bound to arise after events of this magnitude. At the same time, novel's focus seems to be squarely on healing and recovery, both of the physical, medically oriented variety and of the deeper spiritual kind. The author's meditation on medicine -- as a form augury, compassion, and control are thoughtful and touching. But, as difficult as parts of this book were to read, particularly those concerning the tortuous home life of the tiger's wife herself, there were times when I wished it was a bit more grounded, and maybe a bit more brutal. Recommended, perhaps, but with many reservations. Dear reader, you'll have to make your own mind up about this one. show less

Death and superstition go hand in hand in this debut novel just as they do in its setting of the Balkans. Natalia, a young doctor who grew up under the influence of her grandfather, also a doctor in war torn Belgrade, is on her way across the newly established border to inoculate orphans of the war when she learns of her grandfather's death. She continues her mission, but is consumed by the memories of her childhood and the stories he doled out to her with the admonition, "there are some stories you keep to yourself."

Grandfather was a shepherd, a lonely job with the time for a young boy to teach himself to read and the solitude to foster his imagination. His only book was The Jungle Book so it's no wonder that the legend of a tiger show more fills his mind and becomes part of his childhood myth. Obreht weaves the stories of the tiger's wife and the deathless man that shadow him throughout the reality of his tumultuous adult years.

So it this book reverie or reality? Does it matter? I found myself succumbing to the past and getting lost in the fuzziness of magic realism which this young Orange Prize winner does so well. Although we get hints of the ethnic hatred of the Balkan region, I don't consider this a historical novel but one of escape reading where the truth can be found at the crossroads of fact and fantasy. Please note that this is my interpretation of the book. You may read it and come to an entirely different conclusion which, to me, is the sign of a reflective book. show less

The essence of this book is an elegy, narrated by Natalia Stefanovic to her grandfather. As a young doctor, Natalia is on a trip across the border to provide immunizations to an orphanage. While on this journey she learns from her grandmother that her grandfather has died somewhere near Natalia's destination. The family thinks that the grandfather was on his way to meet Natalia, but to Natalia this makes no sense.

While trying to provide care to the orphans, Natalia tries to make sense of and some peace with the loss. She tells us that "everything necessary to understand my grandfather lies between two stories: the story of the tiger's wife and the story of the deathless man." From there the narrator takes us through her life with her show more grandfather and the importance of these two stories in his life.

However, these two stories are only borders of her grandfather's essence and like Russian nesting dolls, there are stories within the stories which open up to us as the narrative progresses. Many of these stories are folkloric with hints of animism and magical realism. War is the back drop for many of these stories and there are often parent-less children at the heart of the stories

I have read this book twice and listened to it as an audiobook once. The narrative is complex in it's structure, but it is complete as the author explores the territory of loss and mourning. Just as geographical boundaries and borders shift as a result of the wars that have scarred the Balkans, the boundaries between life and death as well as hope and despair move in the heart of the narrator as she comes to term with the loss of a grandfather who has been a pillar of strength in her life. show less

"The Tiger's Wife" left me with mixed feelings. Much of it is fascinating and beautiful, and without a doubt, Obreht is a talented writer and gifted story teller. That latter talent though, introduced a major weakness in this book--she has simply too many tales to fit comfortably into this one novel. Though they all intersect, the side-stories distract from the two main narratives, which are the grandfather's childhood with the tiger and the tiger's wife and the granddaughter's present day effort to cope with his death as she works as a doctor in a war-torn region. Even these two primary stories are somewhat in tension, competing for our interest; ultimately the grandfather's tale wins out. Some logic and motivation are missing from the show more telling of the events in the granddaughter's life. Her story is much less completely thought out, and therefore less interesting. Whenever we left the grandfather's childhood village, I felt disappointed and somewhat impatient--the detours did not add much to his strong core story. Obreht's editor should have encouraged her to take all of these other pieces out to either publish them as a set of related short stories or to use them as the beginnings of novels in their own right. That would have left the story of the grandfather and the tiger's wife, which would have needed hardly anything else to stand on its own as a powerful, moving piece.

A final thought about this book, which relates only to the subject matter of the Balkan conflict and not the author's handling of it. Throughout my reading of this book, I often thought of China Mieville's amazing book [b:The City & the City|4703581|The City & the City|China Miéville|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1320475957s/4703581.jpg|4767909], set in a fictional area of conflict between two literally overlapping city states. Reading Obreht's book made Mieville's seem that much more amazing. show less

Obrhet has woven a mesmerizing tale. Myth combines with reality to create a series of rich histories - family, social, and political. War plays a significant role in the story, with the confusing new reality created by the outcome being no less fantastic than the fable of the tiger's wife or the presence of the deathless man. Geographic and political boundaries are shown to be as absurd (or, from a different perspective, as rational) as the superstitions of those within those boundaries. As I learned about Natalia's grandfather through her memories and his stories, I was immersed in a Balkan world described so effortlessly and richly by Obreht that my senses came alive. I could see his world - hear it - smell it - taste it. The show more storytelling has the power to transport. I found The Tiger's Wife to be an incredibly mature debut. It will be hard for her to match, but let's hope she does. show less

When I was pregnant with my first child, I took a solo visit to the San Diego Zoo. I stood in front of the black panther’s enclosure and tried get the attention of the big cat perched on an overhang. I used what I knew about house cats and turned my head partially away and looked at the panther through the narrow slits of my half-closed eyelids. It worked; the panther looked at me with great interest. Soon he and I were locked in an intense stare, each clearly aware of the other’s existence in that moment.

The big cat’s attention and the fact of the baby growing in my belly both made me feel important and chosen. They felt connected in some way.

One of the trio of zoo visitors a little closer to the enclosure said, “I wouldn’t show more want to be the person that panther’s staring at.” The others laughed in agreement and looked over their shoulders to follow the panther’s gaze. They stopped laughing when they saw me. They moved on soon after.

I thought of this experience while reading about the tiger’s wife. She was an outcast whose connection to a big cat brought her a sense of importance and belonging. She still stood apart from the people around her but now it was for different reasons than those that usually set her apart.

When I was ten years old, my family moved from California to Ohio, from the Navy bases with which I’d grown familiar to an Air Force base that seemed alien. Accustomed to the semi-outdoor building style of California, I couldn’t get the hang of navigating hallways that were inside of buildings and I continually found myself lost inside my school building. The disorientation I felt extended to the social interactions of my peers, which left me feeling shut out and confused. For several years I harbored a fantasy of being discovered by a modeling agency, which would be proof that there was something of value in me that my peers couldn’t see. If I couldn’t fit in, I could at least be set apart in a way that would show them how wrong they were not to accept me.

Gradually, I realized that, despite my recurrent dreams of being stretched taller in my sleep, I was unlikely to wake up one morning leggy and willowy. The “discovered as a model” fantasy morphed into one about publishing a novel. I wrote my first novel when I was 12. It was about a girl born somewhere in the middle of a family of twelve children who did something about which she was so ashamed that she shut herself in some hidden room in her family’s rambling old house and eventually got scurvy because she neglected to take any citrus fruits with her when she hid herself. With such a compelling plotline, I was certain I would have a novel published by the time I was 16. When that didn’t happen, it was sure to happen by the time I finished undergrad. Then by the time I turned 30. Now maybe by the time my kids go to college?

The “famous author” fantasy has weakened with the knowledge that if I don’t write a novel and I’m too afraid to submit anything, there’s not much chance of being published. But it’s not faded enough that I can read critically acclaimed books by authors my age and younger without some mixed feelings.

Téa Obreht is two years younger than my baby brother and here she has this epic, half-mythical story that has drawn me in and left me pondering the nature of the stories that make up our lives. She writes about the tales that we construct around events so that they make sense to us and give our lives purpose and meaning. She writes about recurrent themes, the threads of meaning that run through our lives. Her book approaches (but doesn’t quite reach) the level of Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude (the title of which I always say in Spanish when I say it out loud because I think it sounds cooler. It probably just makes me sound like a prig, but I still do it).

In spite of the way I’m going on, The Tiger’s Wife isn’t a perfect book. The jumping around in time gets confusing in places and the revelation at the crossroads is decidedly anticlimactic, but there are so many little interwoven tales and so much meaning beneath them that the book is really a pleasure to read throughout. I feel like I’m sitting in front of a fire hearing tales from my own grandfather or from a travel-worn journeyer with whom I’ve crossed paths, a feeling that is difficult to reconcile with the non-gray hair and unlined face in Obreht’s author photo.

I look at her picture on the back flap of her book, and I kind of want to hate her, but I can’t. She wrote an impressive book. She found an agent and published her impressive book. I’ve done neither, even though I’ve had almost a decade longer to do so than she has. So I can’t really hate her. Instead, I just feel morose about my own ineffectual longing for something that is entirely within my power to realize. Of course, I know that neither hatred nor moroseness (nor even longing) is going to help me reach this dream. I need to either work toward it or give it up.

Or I guess I could just keep writing about it in book reviews until I get sick of talking about it. show less

The Tiger's Wife has been on my radar for a while now due to its notoriety and near-constant presence on the New York Times Best Seller list for months on end. When it eventually came up on the reading list of the book club I joined earlier this year I was glad to finally read it.
One of my favorite things about this book is how realism and fantasy are intertwined almost inseparably, how every plot line is tied inextricably to another and how much it reminded me of the story traditions I grew up with. Obreht is from the Balkans, I am from Ukraine, and while there are obviously differences there are also similarities that ring true, a result of our Slavic roots with a patina of the Ottoman invasion centuries ago, thicker for some, more show more transparent for others. I could also really see and relate to how she described it in an interview for RFERL:

...there's a concept of "a Balkan story." Even small stories are somehow big, huge. There's a moment in a Balkan story when the line between mythology, legend, and the story become irrelevant. Somehow, that mythology becomes a truth in itself and it becomes a very personal truth. The way in which you receive a story becomes your truth, and then it becomes the truth for the person you're telling the story to. That is very much our way...

I read the novel very quickly and only when it was finished did a thought form in my mind that the book is ultimately about death. This alone didn't faze me, after all I read The Book Thief earlier this year, and it was narrated by Death. What did surprise me though was finding out how young the author is. I could hardly imagine how a woman in her early 20s could have this kind of darkness in her enough to write a book like this. Don't get me wrong, The Tiger's Wife is not depressing by any means (there are a couple novels I read this year alone that were much more depressing), it is rather a matter-of-fact approach that regards death as part of life, sometimes difficult to reconcile oneself with but always present. The subject however is dark nonetheless.
I also very much enjoyed Obreht's writing style. It was proper without being stuffy and easy without being overly conversational. This is a literary novel that avoids boring the reader to tears and instead pulls one along with it through the many subplots until legends unwind into life and people with secrets, fears and hardships. The historical backdrop and very realistic details of family life, which I now know are autobiographical, give richness to these legends, provide a fertile environment for them, ground them and even help develop them better. I didn't know much about the history or culture of the Balkans before reading this book but now I am curious and will most likely look for more books and folklore of the region.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and if you are intimidated by its fame and international acclaim I urge you to disregard those reservations and give it a chance. It is well worth your time. Just don't expect everything to be presented to you neatly tied with a bow on top, you will be expected to make the leaps necessary to gather all the threads together from time to time, and you may even arrive at conclusions that won't match your fellow readers'. This exact thing happened in our book club and made for an interesting discussion. show less