Thank you to Random House Publishing Group for providing me with a copy of K-Ming Chang’s novel, Bestiary, in exchange for an honest review.

K-Ming Chang’s Bestiary tells the stories of different generations of the same Taiwanese family who has immigrated to the United States, first ending up in Arkansas and finally settling in California.

Bestiary is one of the most unusual stories that I have ever read. It’s not told in a linear fashion, instead it is like being tossed about in waves, as it shifts from different perspectives and blurs the lines between mythology, magical realism and reality.

For example, a chapter that made a big impression on me, had a father and young son’s violent altercation shift to where they were like kites fighting in the wind, with the mother/sister observing the action. I thought this was a fascinating way to describe an abusive relationship as it allowed for a new perspective. It shifted from the POV of the father/son, to the mother/daughter who are silent observers to the abuse. The distance of the perspective was almost more horrific than the moments when the violence is close. It was cinematic in its effect.

I’m not Taiwanese and I’m certain that many of the cultural/mythological references went over my head. However, I was still absolutely transfixed by Chang’s writing. Her phrasing and style is truly unique. I often stopped to read passages aloud simply to delight in her words. Her writing is visceral, unexpected, and honest. I recommend Bestiary as a work of art that is quite special.

I did receive review copies of this book from Goodreads and NetGalley.

Idk. There is a lot of really interesting stuff going on here, but none of it resolves and I was frustrated by nearly every choice Chang made for this book. Obviously this book is not for me/I'm not the right reader for it.

2/5

BESTIARY
By K-Ming Chang

As a Taiwanese descent I was so excited to read this book on the mythological retelling inspired by Hu Gu Po. I enjoyed reading this magical realism story that incorporates fantasy, a multi-generational matriarchal Taiwanese-American family, and a queer modern love story that will capture your heart and soul.

This was a very unique read for me and found that the lyrical prose impressive and quite entertaining. Keep your mind open to the mystery surrounding the myth of the tiger spirit A beautiful debut and coming-of-age story that I was fascinated by reading this special book. I enjoyed the story of migration, traumas and belonging. This was a fantastic read for me.

K-Ming Chang's Bestiary will not be a book that will be universally loved, and that's okay. It's a book that will make readers feel - love, pain, discomfort. It's a powerful debut novel that covers three generations of Taiwanese Americans as they navigate issues of migration, sexuality, and secrets.

Many thanks to the author, NetGalley, and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book. All thoughts are my own.

“She said she must have dreamt of growing a tail just like this when she was a girl, but sometimes a wound skips a generation or two, appearing again in the body that is almost ready to wield it.”

I read this one a week ago & I am still haunted by its words and story. It’s a story that centers a queer Taiwanese American woman unfolding the layers of her lineage to her lover through letters from the women in her family & stories passed on.

It explores the multiple layers of generational trauma embedded with mythical aspects in such a lyrical way. It’s as if you found yourself imagining the stories you might have overheard of past family members you never got to meet.

Pro tip- If you can, make sure you read a physical copy of this. I felt like my experience with this book could have been vastly different if I had a physical copy of it or perhaps I was imagining a different experience because I was craving getting physical with this book.

I loved this book! It was weird and magical and unlike the books I normally gravitate to, and that all made it special.

The generations of storytelling were lovely and furthered the folklore and magic of it all.

I felt like it was experimental in its writing and form. There were places I got lost, but I was so entranced by the story that I pushed through. I am interested to see what the author does next.

It’s the best of books, but it’s the worst of books. K-Ming Chang has made her mark on modern literature, and her debut novel, Bestiary, has already made a number of prestigious lists. My thanks go to Net Galley and Random House for the invitation to read and review; sadly, its twisted edginess is too intense for me.

This much-buzzed-about book is for sale now.

How many triggers are packed into this one little book? All of them. Every trigger you can possibly think of, plus she may have made a few more up on the spot. There is violence a-plenty here, and the graphic child abuse and elder abuse provide such visceral imagery that I may never get it out of my head. I abandoned this book faster than just about any I can recall, and although I was certain it was the right thing to do for myself, I nevertheless experienced a twinge of regret along with it, because it is obvious from the first page that this author can write.

My gut hunch is that younger adult readers with cast-iron stomachs and level dispositions will be the most appreciative demographic for this one, but wimps like me will need to give it a pass. It is to the former that this book is recommended.

I abandoned this book after about 50% of the way in. As much as I tend to enjoy unconventional structure and fantastical elements, it was difficult for me to attach to the characters, and I didn't look forward to returning to it.

I loved Bestiary! K-Ming Chang is a strong writer by constructing sentences that feel magical and fly off the page unlike anything else. The story itself is everything that I was expecting and more. I especially loved the central theme of queerness that echoes throughout this book. Overall, my experience with this book was great and I would recommend it to anyone looking to get blown away by beautiful writing and a magical story.

Man, what a ride. This is more myth than reality, more poetry than prose. It certainly packs a punch, but I'm still not entirely sure what it all means. It's one of the weirdest books I've read this year, but there's no doubt it made me feel something. Very strange and powerful at the same time.

Bestiary follows three Taiwanese-American women - and that's about the only thing that made sense to me in this book. I felt like I was stuck in murky water trying to find my way to the surface of this book. With the magical realism and the mythology, I was just lost throughout the story.

This is not necessarily an easy read in its graphicness, but you also could not call this a boring read. The language author K-Ming Chang uses throughout is sharp, sometimes acerbic, but it certainly gets the point across. The magical realism woven throughout gives this book a fantastical, otherworldly feel, almost like a fairy tale, while still grounding it in the very real emotions each tale provokes. This is definitely the kind of book that some will love and others will find difficult to stomach (as I admittedly sometimes did), but if you’re interested at all in checking it out, I would recommend it.

After finishing this, I'm unsure of whether I liked it or not? It's not necessarily bad, but I was often confused by the writing style and had to go back and reread paragraphs over and over again. There were parts that I really liked, but also parts that had be incredibly confused.

The writing is really pretty in some places, and there are some truly beautiful quotes in this book, but the writing was also what made me confused a majority of the time. Having the stories within stories was an interesting reading experience because it was sometimes hard to tell what was real and what was a metaphor for something else. But sometimes it was just too metaphorical and didn't make sense? Maybe it's just me.

I liked the intergenerational aspect! This is something that I don't see too often in books, but it was really interesting to see the complicatedness of their relationships.

I think the biggest turn off for this book is the sheer amount of times that bodily fluids are mentioned in this book? I'm not a squeamish person at all, but I didn't see the purpose of including "laughed so hard until they pissed" and other scenarios involving bodily fluids so often. It just seemed unnecessary?

Overall, I think this was a really unique book that I honestly can't tell if I liked or not, but it was definitely an interesting reading experience.

* 2.5 stars *

Bestiary was queer fiction that revolved around main character’s family history and folklore. It was about life of Taiwan-American family, their life before and after migration, poverty, survival, domestic abuse, trauma, resilience, myths and legend.

Plot was weird. It was part LGBTQ love story, coming of age, and part magical realism about family connection and story of three generations of Taiwanese American women, their family history and queer lineage, and about human nature and experiences told through lots of metaphors and anthropomorphism.

What I understand is – It started with how main characters’ family journeyed to west, to Arkansas, story of Hu Gu Po- a tiger spirit living in a woman’s body who hungered for children’s toes. And soon after hearing this story, main character woke up with tiger tail, her love for new girl in school- Ben- who was also strange and poor like her and help her in understanding her family history through letters of grandmother popping out of holes in backyard.

Her father was abusive and bully so was her grandmother. I didn’t like them and I don’t understand most of the story related to grandmother. Her father’s and grandfather’s stories made most sense. I liked their migration stories and great-grandfather’s relationship with pirate, and main character’s relationship with Ben. Her mother’s sisters’ stories were weird that was told through grandmothers’ letter for each of her daughters.

Writing was poetic, bizarre and very gritty and raw. It was first person narrative non-linear storyline that told the life story of Mother, Grandmother and the Daughter from mostly Daughter’s perspective who remains unnamed throughout the book. It was highly imaginary, wild, and without any boundaries. There was violence, uncomfortable and gross narration with lots of pissing, shitting, and other bodily descriptions; and sky, moon and stars were described in most unusual way. Here are some sentences about them, some were impressive while some were weird-

“Sky is cussing rain at us in the afternoon…”

“It was early in the night and the sky was bad-breathed, freckled with stars like white bacteria on the tongue.”

“Clouds mopping up the sky’s spilled light.”

“One time we saw Ben’s father stand here at the edge and pee into the hole, competing with the sky to see whose rain reached the deepest roots.”

“Strands of the blood whipped so high, the sky was red for days and everyone thought it had miscarried the sun.”

“The morning we leave, the sun sags in the sky like a scrotum.”

It was most unusual book I ever have read. I didn’t get most of the story. I struggled while reading this book. It’s as if I’m missing the point and that feeling got worse by the end. My mind got lost in trying make sense of all things. After I read reviews, I feel like it’s only me who couldn’t figure out this book. This book is definitely not for me.

Overall, Bestiary was weird, unusual, graphic, and lyrical literary fiction, a story of trauma, survival, family, and queer lineage. Some readers will like this while some wouldn’t.

Truly awesome, multi-generational weaving of family history, myth and legend with evolving place and time. I was swept away by this story.

“Bestiary” by K-Ming Chang had been on my to- be-read list ever since I heard of its upcoming release. The synopsis was just so intriguing and really pulled me in. I was so excited to get some Asian folklore as well as magical realism. While there are aspects of this book that I liked, I have to admit that the writing style lost me at times. Overall, I found this to be an ok read.

2.5ish? This was this a rough read for me. It has too much to do with orifices, shit, penis, anus, piss, spit, and other general bodily grossness not to mention physical abuse. I feel like somewhere between all that horror was a quirky own-voices allegory trimmed in magical realism. Buuut mostly I just kept thinking, “this is some serious weirdness needing to be critiqued with the abject theory.” I am a fan of many types of weirdness, but not so much this book. I won’t be taking to time to scour this novel with Kristeva’s psychological brilliance, but someone someday totally will.

BESTIARY revolves around alternate perspectives by three generations of Taiwanese-American women: ama, mother and daughter. When the daughter and her brother dig a series of holes in their backyard and the holes become open and hungry, a tiger tail grows in the daughter after she is beaten by her mother as a punishment. As a Taiwanese descendant, I was immediately impressed by the concept.

I have complicated feelings about this book - my whole experience with this novel was whether I was missing something.
I really appreciated that this novel was inspired by Hu Gu Po, a famous and old Taiwanese mythology - reading it felt like navigating in a familiar ground. Through grotesque images, Chang paints the desire of each character and explores intimacy inside the family. The author also incorporates violent impulses to illustrate the generational trauma and at the same time, unfolds layers of buried (literally and figuratively) secrets of the entire lineage.

While the Taiwanese cultural elements were accurate and refreshing, unfortunately some aspects of this book didn't work for me.
To begin with, I found the writing poetic yet crude - the palpitating language isn't for everyone and it often distracted my reading. I usually enjoy when the reality blends with imaginary, however the magical realism in this case wasn't favorable for me to follow the storyline and it felt disjointed at times. Additionally, I couldn't get into the bodily functions/fluids and visceral descriptions. Even though the grandmother's letters were original in structure and relevant to the plot, I didn't fully capture its essence. I know the author's intention to create a chaotic work, but my interest was back and forth nonetheless.

I truly wanted to love this mythological retelling. BESTIARY is unique, playful and can offer a surreal experience for many readers. It is a story that demands time and feels like a process of excavation. I very much enjoyed the moral of the story and the subjective footnotes but I think that I didn't dig deep enough, hence this book is worth a re-read. Still having many unresolved questions, I listened to "Kirkus Fully Booked podcast with K-Ming Chang" and it was very helpful.
Readers who enjoy migration story or mythological retelling or queer love story should give BESTIARY a try.

(I initially read BESTIARY in ebook format and it didn't help with my reading experience - this format compromised the letters structure and footnotes. Thus I highly recommend reading this book in physical format.)

[ I received an ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest review ]

I didn't enjoy Bestiary as much as I could have because of the writing style. While the book was definitely poetic, each paragraph's end sounded like it was the end of the novel and it annoyed me. I needed more variety in the writing - I think the story was lacking because its focus was so much on the fancy words.

The story was okay - reading about mother-daughter relationships is always nice - and I enjoyed reading about the three generations of Taiwanese-American women. However, there were some pretty big fantastical elements in an otherwise realistic plot, and I couldn't tell if they were actually happening or not. Like, I know that it's supposed to be a metaphor, but did the daughter actually have a tiger's tail? Again, I was confused and annoyed. This book also had a lot of gross descriptions in it, which were realistic but I did not enjoy reading those parts at all.

I'm giving Bestiary three stars because I appreciated the language at times, but otherwise this book was just okay.

Bestiary tells the story of three generations of Taiwanese American women. We hear from Grandmother, Mother and Daughter. It is a story about migration, tradition, culture, and love.

After her mother tells her a story about a tiger spirit, Daughter wakes up one morning to find that she has sprouted a tiger tail. The story is one of magical realism and is a fantastic melding of folklore and a modern immigrant and love story. Daughter tries to unwind her family history and how it is linked to folklore. The story is loaded with strange and quirky things and the language is stunning and lyrical. It is definitely a twisty tale full of allusions and metaphors. I just got drawn into the flow of the story.

Overall, I consider this an impressive debut novel! K-Ming Chang is an author that I will be keeping my eye on.