The Valley of Amazement

Losses. Amy Tan’s latest 600-page novel is titled, The Valley of Amazement. Set in Shanghai, San Francisco and a little in upstate New York, the novel presents the lives of multiple generations across four decades starting early in the 20th century. Tan excels at describing the situation of women in society, and in this novel she leans heavily on the losses and setbacks in the lives of mothers and daughters. There’s plenty of sex, violence, love and death on these pages to last through many hours of reading. Amy Tan fans are those readers most likely to enjoy this novel. Some readers may find the story bloated and packed with more detail than necessary. I expected tension in the mother-daughter relationships, and found plenty of that in this sweeping novel along with much more to say about the condition of women at that time and in those places. Rating: Four-star (I like it) Click here to purchase The Valley of Amazement from amazon.com.