The Foreigner
Francie Lin, 2008
Macmillan Picador
320 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780312364045
Summary
Set against the Taiwanese criminal underworld, The Foreigner is Francie Lin's audacious debut novel. A noirish tale about family, fraternity, conscience, and the curious gulf between a man's culture and his deepest self.
Emerson Chang is a mild mannered bachelor on the cusp of forty, a financial analyst in a neatly pressed suit, a child of Taiwanese immigrants who doesn't speak a word of Chinese, and, well, a virgin. His only real family is his mother, whose subtle manipulations have kept him close—all in the name of preserving an obscure idea of family and culture.
But when his mother suddenly dies, Emerson sets out for Taipei to scatter her ashes, and to convey a surprising inheritance to his younger brother, Little P. Now enmeshed in the Taiwanese criminal underworld, Little P seems to be running some very shady business out of his uncle's karaoke bar, and he conceals a secret—a crime that has not only severed him from his family, but may have annihilated his conscience. Hoping to appease both the living and the dead, Emerson isn’t about to give up the inheritance until he uncovers Little P's past, and saves what is left of his family.
The Foreigner is a darkly comic tale of crime and contrition, and a riveting story about what it means to be a foreigner—even in one's own family. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
Francie Lin, a Harvard graduate and former editor at the Threepenny Review, received a Fulbright Fellowship to Taiwan in 2001-2002. She lives in Greenfield, Massachusetts. (From the publisher.)
Book Reviews
Genre-wise, The Foreigner is best described as a thriller, rife with murders, drugs, secrets and betrayals. But you won't find any of the cardboard characters, clunky writing or clichéd conventions that too often mar suspense fiction. Lin is equally attentive to description and plot. As Emerson walks down the street one day, he notes that the sky "moved above me with the threat of solemnity and grace. A bird sang two high notes in the black slate landscape." The executor of his mother's estate is a "tall, cadaverous man with a voice that rasped like a twig." It's that lovely, detailed writing that makes you care about what happens to these characters more than you might have otherwise.
Carmela Ciuraru - Los Angeles Times
In Lin's stunning debut, a crime novel set in Taiwan, Emerson Chang, a 40-year-old virgin who's a financial analyst, travels from San Francisco to Taipei on a quest to scatter his mother's ashes and re-establish contact with his shady younger brother, Little P, who's been bequeathed the family hotel. At a meeting with Little P, Chang encounters two peculiar cousins, Poison and Big One, as well as Little P's devious friend, Li An-Qing (aka Atticus), who's anxious to get Little P to sell the family hotel to him. Emerson soon finds himself mixed up in machinations involving Atticus and extortion due to Little P's unsavory dealings. In addition, Emerson loses his job back in California, and the property he's inherited in Taipei turns out to have its own mysteries. Chang's distinctive voice propels a strong and original plot, with horrifying revelations. Taut, smart and often funny, this novel will satisfy readers of thrillers and general fiction alike.
Publishers Weekly
Crime fiction that tells us about life in mainland China have become so common (such authors as Lisa See and Qiu Xiaolong are among the leading practitioners) that it comes as a surprise to realize how little we know about what goes on in the darker streets of Taiwan. Fortunately for us, Francie Lin—a Harvard graduate and a former editor of The Threepenny Review—spent two years in Taiwan on a Fulbright Fellowship, which doubtlessly planted in her mind the idea for her absolutely riveting debut thriller. It's about a 40-year-old bachelor called Emerson Chang, a San Francisco financial analyst who doesn't speak a word of Chinese. He has spent his life looking after, and being browbeaten by, his Formosa-born mother, a tough cookie who runs a cheap motel she has renamed the Remeda Inn to suck in the chain's runoff. Mrs. Chang wears her nationality like overdone makeup, saying that her only wish is to have her ashes scattered on her native ground. When she dies, Emerson—after being somewhat shaken by the news of her large bequest to his younger brother, Little P, who deserted the family and is now deeply involved in the Taiwanese criminal underworld—sets off for Taiwan, where Little P seems to be running some very shady business out of his uncle's karaoke bar. Lin catches the flavor of the Taiwanese world—especially its underworld—with great skill. But she is best at combining her action scenes with touching moments of memory, as Emerson realizes how much his mother lost by coming to America. In a Taiwan hotel lobby, waiting for Little P to show up, Emerson listens to "the nasal strains of an old Shanghainese pop song.... My mother had liked these pop songs from the mainland herself, the old, plaintive ghost of Shanghai glamour."—Dick Adler
Barnes & Noble
A 40-year-old Taiwanese-American virgin tracks his younger brother into the worst of all possible worlds. Compulsively dutiful Emerson Chang has arrived in the crime-ridden city of Taipei bent on a double mission. Because his mother wants her ashes scattered in the land of her birth, he's carried them there. "At least she was easier to manage in her new form," he reflects. And because he's certain it would have pleased her, he'll hunt for Little P (P for Peter), a quintessentially undutiful son, but her favorite nonetheless. It's been ten years since he's heard from his rascally kid brother, but the instant he locates him, Emerson, who can be as naive as Candide, already knows that he's run true to form. Hard-bitten, shifty and less than delighted at the reunion, Little P now works for an uncle managing the family karaoke bar. Though Emerson speaks no Chinese, even he can spot sleaziness this obvious. This is no ordinary karaoke bar, and its employees, Poison and Big One, are no ordinary cousins but blood-thirsty thugs from whom Emerson instinctively recoils. But it's Little P who keeps the establishment's secret, a secret so ugly and embittering that it ends by pitting brother against brother with biblical fury. Lin can write, and this darkly funny debut is often engrossing, but would that her bachelor protagonist had been a shade less prissy.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Emerson’s mother has a complicated relationship with America – she seems to believe that America has its value, but that it also poses a threat. Why does she think that American culture will taint her children, and what is this “idea” that she claims to be protecting when she insists that Emerson marry a Chinese woman?
2. Along those same lines, is it common for one generation to wish that the next generation marry within the family’s cultural group? Why?
3. Why do you think Emerson’s mother wills the hotel to Little P? Is she betraying her loyal son, or do you think she had a larger scheme in mind?
4. Were you surprised to discover that Emerson is a virgin? Did you notice any early clues regarding his chastity? How do you think he managed to remain a virgin for so long? Did his mother play a role? At the same time, why did he resist J-‘s advances while at the same time doing so much to court her?
5. What does J- mean when she says “that’s all it is”? Are her words echoed in the behavior of Little P, or any of the other characters? Is she telling Emerson to abandon his lofty beliefs about sex and love, or is she simply imploring him to be more human?
6. Discuss the role of Atticus in the story. In what way are his ideals different from Emerson’s, or from Emerson’s mother’s – are they both attempting to preserve the same“idea”? Is Atticus corrupt, misguided, or nobly fighting an unwinable battle?
7. In what ways are Emerson and Little P alike? Underneath their differences, do they share an unbreakable bond? What is the difference between an obligation to a family member, and an obligation to a friend or stranger?
8. Why is it so difficult for Emerson to part with his mother’s ashes? Does the ceremony of consigning her to the afterlife matter to him? Does Emerson believe in a cosmology, an afterlife, or in anything beyond the realm of human consciousness (“It was a kind of immortality, I suppose, to live on in an idea”)? Or is the physical world simply more important to him? Would you say that Emerson’s principles serve as a kind of religion instead?
9. Little P harbors many dark secrets, and he has committed unspeakable crimes. Are his worst crimes forgivable? Consider that Little P is Emerson’s only real connection to the past, to his own childhood—does the value of that connection make Little P worth holding on to? What exactly makes Emerson run off the plane at the end of Part I?
10. Why do Emerson and Little P remember the family hotel so differently? Why does Emerson have so many happy memories, while Little P obviously couldn’t wait to fly away from it?
11. Who do you think is a better romantic match for Emerson, Angel or Grace? Are perhaps neither of them suitable?
12. What do you think of the poem, “Osprey”, which is crudely translated into English by Grace on page 215? What does this poem tell the reader about Grace, and how she feels about love? Discuss how Francie Lin uses the poem to reveal another side of Grace (she is the only character to express herself with poetry, although Emerson certainly has a poetic soul). Is the courtly language of the poem intended to be funny, touching, or both?
13. Discuss how the idea of identity—and of what we expect from ourselves, based on our culture—is woven throughout the novel. Is the very island of Taiwan itself in the grip of an identity crisis, with regard to its politics and its history? And is there a bit of role reversal between China and Taiwan—who is exploiting whom in this novel?
14. Why does Emerson believe, on first arrival in Taiwan, that if he listens hard enough, he will be able to understand Chinese? Is anything elemental about our character and who we are?
15. The Foreigner cleverly plays with conventions of the crime novel – there is gunplay, gambling, gangsters, and much tough talk among a threatening cast of characters. But in what ways is this novel different, how does Francie Lin distort these common elements of the crime genre? Are the characters more vulnerable, more fallible, or perhaps simply more strange and eccentric than the kind you usually find in the crime genre? Are they more human?
16. At the end of the novel, who is the shadowy figure who falls from the bridge? Is it Poison, Little P? Are we intended to know for certain?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
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