BRIEF Review
crazy rich asians by kevin kwan
High Net Worth Bit of Rom-Com Fun
As the world prepares itself for the release of the first all-Asian movie in almost fifty years, I was lucky enough to receive the full collection from Anchor Books, New York. And what a collection. The trilogy has exploded across bookish social media communities, the instantly-recognisable covers are all over Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. Though I’m not usually a fan of literature gone viral, I made an exception for this series based on my personal experience with exactly these kind of high net-worth individuals coming out of China and taking the world by storm.
July 4, 2018
And oh yeah, he also inherited an empire that had already been set up four generations before him. I think he looks down on people like your father -- people who are self-made -- because at the heart of it he is a deeply insecure individual.
Rich People Problems by Kevin Kwan (2018)
Crazy Rich Asians follows the life and times of an American Chinese woman from a modest background and her secretly very wealthy Singaporean boyfriend. It has all the makings of a comfortable, light-hearted rom-com.
First of all, the beast reduction was one of the most astute moves you could have made, and your physique is now optimal.
China Rich Girlfriend by Kevin Kwan (2015)
But what really stands out about Crazy Rich Asians is the actual reality of absolutely staggering behind it. Kevin Kwan makes some exceptionally poignant observations about a class of people who are overturning the assumed monopoly on elitism traditionally thought to be held by European aristocrats and certain American banking families. In 2018, in Kevin Kwan’s world, European aristocrats are reduced to shameless social climbers, scrabbling at gold-plated skirts of Asia’s new money.
And yet, the remnants of the colonial inferiority complex still stir at the edges of Asian elite society. Disproportionate respect for British-accented English, British education and European fashion designers, architects and artists preoccupies even the most fervently and distinctly Asian of these elites. In one breath, the characters will complain about European fashion houses patronising Asian high net-worth customers with made-for-China designs (China Rich Girlfriend) and then plan a spontaneous trip to Paris, because the shopping is just better there (apparently). The discrepancy between looking down on the old families of Europe, while simultaneously coveting European royalty and titles (Rich People Problems), interrogates the psychological legacy of colonialism, which manifests even among the world’s most privileged.
Though I enjoyed all the books immensely, I did take issue with aspects of Kwan’s portrayal of female characters and their relationships, particularly as the trilogy came to a close.
I first started reading Crazy Rich Asians as part of my female authors, female protagonists challenge, where I only read female-authored books or books with a female protagonist for one year. Though Crazy Rich Asians is told from many different points of view, it had two primary protagonists, one of whom was female. I started reading on the basis that one of the protagonists would be female, but, to my horror, she was almost completely absent in the third book! The majority of the book focused on Nick and his grandmother (whose background story was revealed in tantalisingly brief detail — we need more of Ah Ma’s story!!), and Rachel just popped in and out to push Nick’s storyline in the right direction. I resented her relegation to the position of plot device or passenger (or, dare I say it, the position of wife).
The biggest issue for me in terms of gender though was the ongoing and unnecessarily bitchy conflict between female characters. Sure, every plot need rivalries and enemies, but have we not yet gotten over the idea that female relationships can only ever be toxic, bitchy and soul destroying? For those of you who made it to the third instalment, I’m talking about a specific stepmother-stepdaughter relationship. It made me sad, quite honestly. It was a real downer of a side-line plot which could, in all honesty, have just been omitted. It added nothing to the overall reading experience, unlike the mother versus potential daughter-in-law or potential alternative girlfriends versus actual girlfriend rivalries in the first book, which was necessary to the plot. Kwan’s handling of these initial rivalries was also far more critical, he satirised them, punished those responsible for starting or perpetuating them and led us to also rethink our attitudes towards female relationships. I wish that this approach had continued in the third book, where we were instead led to take a side in his primary female-on-female conflict. It was quite disappointing.
Despite all of this however, I thoroughly enjoyed the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy; I would (and have been doing so) recommend it to anyone even remotely interested in Asia and how it is rapidly reclaiming its former position as the centre of the universe.
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