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Homeseeking: A GMA Book Club Pick
A GOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK
“Homeseeking is about the love of home and family, even against unimaginable circumstances…[A] sweeping epic.” —Good Housekeeping
“Fans of historical fiction will want to pick up this exceptional novel immediately.” —Los Angeles Times
From WWII to 2008, this deeply moving story follows one couple across sixty years as world events pull them together and apart, illuminating the Chinese diaspora and exploring what it means to find home far from your homeland.
Haiwen is buying bananas at a 99 Ranch Market in Los Angeles when he looks up and sees Suchi, his Suchi, for the first time in sixty years. To recently widowed Haiwen it feels like a second chance, but Suchi has only survived by refusing to look back.
Suchi was seven when she first met Haiwen in their Shanghai neighborhood, drawn by the sound of his violin. Their childhood friendship blossomed into soul-deep love, but when Haiwen secretly enlisted in the Nationalist army in 1947 to save his brother from the draft, she was left with just his violin and a note: Forgive me.
Homeseeking follows the separated lovers through six decades of tumultuous Chinese history as war, famine, and opportunity take them separately to the song halls of Hong Kong, the military encampments of Taiwan, the bustling streets of New York, and sunny California, telling Haiwen’s story from the present to the past while tracing Suchi’s from her childhood to the present, meeting in the crucible of their lives. Throughout, Haiwen holds his memories close while Suchi forces herself to look only forward, neither losing sight of the home they hold in their hearts.
At once epic and intimate, Homeseeking is a story of family, sacrifice, and loyalty, and of the power of love to endure beyond distance, beyond time.
“Homeseeking is about the love of home and family, even against unimaginable circumstances…[A] sweeping epic.” —Good Housekeeping
“Fans of historical fiction will want to pick up this exceptional novel immediately.” —Los Angeles Times
From WWII to 2008, this deeply moving story follows one couple across sixty years as world events pull them together and apart, illuminating the Chinese diaspora and exploring what it means to find home far from your homeland.
Haiwen is buying bananas at a 99 Ranch Market in Los Angeles when he looks up and sees Suchi, his Suchi, for the first time in sixty years. To recently widowed Haiwen it feels like a second chance, but Suchi has only survived by refusing to look back.
Suchi was seven when she first met Haiwen in their Shanghai neighborhood, drawn by the sound of his violin. Their childhood friendship blossomed into soul-deep love, but when Haiwen secretly enlisted in the Nationalist army in 1947 to save his brother from the draft, she was left with just his violin and a note: Forgive me.
Homeseeking follows the separated lovers through six decades of tumultuous Chinese history as war, famine, and opportunity take them separately to the song halls of Hong Kong, the military encampments of Taiwan, the bustling streets of New York, and sunny California, telling Haiwen’s story from the present to the past while tracing Suchi’s from her childhood to the present, meeting in the crucible of their lives. Throughout, Haiwen holds his memories close while Suchi forces herself to look only forward, neither losing sight of the home they hold in their hearts.
At once epic and intimate, Homeseeking is a story of family, sacrifice, and loyalty, and of the power of love to endure beyond distance, beyond time.
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Community Reviews
thenextgoodbook.com
What’s it about?
Haiwan and Suchi are just children when they meet in Shanghai. Over time, they fall in love, but in 1947, they are separated by circumstances and spend the next sixty years apart. When they meet again, Haiwan is overjoyed, but Suchi refuses to look back and recapture their love.
What did it make me think about?
This novel taught me so much about the history of Taiwan and how it is tied to both Japan and China.
Should I read it?
If you enjoy a sprawling generational saga, then this will be just for you. Spanning from pre-World War II China to the present day, this story has much to reveal about China and Taiwan. It is another work of historical fiction that effortlessly teaches you some history. With so many wars in the news right now, with so many displaced people, this book reminds me of all the difficulties I have never had to face.
Quote-
“Nationalists, Communists- they were all the same. Asking ordinary people to sacrifice their lives, to kill their fellow countrymen, all so their leaders could come to power.”
What’s it about?
Haiwan and Suchi are just children when they meet in Shanghai. Over time, they fall in love, but in 1947, they are separated by circumstances and spend the next sixty years apart. When they meet again, Haiwan is overjoyed, but Suchi refuses to look back and recapture their love.
What did it make me think about?
This novel taught me so much about the history of Taiwan and how it is tied to both Japan and China.
Should I read it?
If you enjoy a sprawling generational saga, then this will be just for you. Spanning from pre-World War II China to the present day, this story has much to reveal about China and Taiwan. It is another work of historical fiction that effortlessly teaches you some history. With so many wars in the news right now, with so many displaced people, this book reminds me of all the difficulties I have never had to face.
Quote-
“Nationalists, Communists- they were all the same. Asking ordinary people to sacrifice their lives, to kill their fellow countrymen, all so their leaders could come to power.”
“She thought about the memories he had cherished, the ones he spent so long holding onto, so long examining. She had never imagined as she tried to erase her past, there’d been someone out there who felt she was worth remembering.”
What a stunning portrait of Chinese history between Japan's invasion, the Chinese Civil War, and the formation of the People Republic of China and Taiwan's role as a refuge, as well as the British occupation of Hong Kong. Cultural identity and patriatism, in addition to these major historical events serve as a backdrop to the love story between Suchi and Heiwen and then we are carried through to the 2000s, as they become immigrants to the United States, raising children in the Western world and trying to hold onto their heritage.
My heart broke more times than I can count.
This is a story with many layers, about the choices and sacrifices that people make and the consequences they live with. It's about regret and reconciliation. It's about finding ones place in the world.
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