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There are currently 18 member reviews
for Sweet Mandarin
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Vicki (Casa Grande AZ)
An engaging family history
Helen Tse's "Sweet Mandarin" succeeds most when she is telling the story of her maternal great-grandfather, an enterprising soy sauce producer and entrepreneur in rural China, and his daughter, Lily, Tse's grandmother, who overcame poverty and worked her way up from a servant and nanny in early Hong Kong to a respected restaurateur in Middleton, England. Tse also includes the story of her parents, who also owned and ran several Chinese restaurants, and a little about how she and her two sisters opened their own Chinese restaurant, called Sweet Mandarin. Mostly, though, this is the engaging story of and tribute to Lily Kwok--a strong and confident woman who made a living and supported her children despite rough times, an unreliable husband, and some hard choices.
This book would appeal to both young-adult and adult readers, and would make for interesting book club discussions. Readers learn what life was like in rural China and early Hong Kong, and also a bit about the Chinese immigrant experience in England in the 1950's. A recommended read.
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Wendy (Kalamazoo MI)
Sweet Mandarin
This book is a great journey through China and beyond and tells the story of three generations of a Chinese family. The golden thread which weaves the generations together is food. We hear about soy sauce, Lily’s chicken curry, Mabel’s claypot chicken, among other dishes. The aromas and flavors of these meals come to life as we watch the triumphs and tragedies of this family. One of the early chapters begins with a Chinese saying: “A child’s life is like a piece of paper on which every one makes a mark.” We see this time and again as each family member pens their mark on another. These women are raised to be strong and independent amid difficult times of loss. They always seem to make it through with a new sense of hope. It’s an enjoyable read!
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Lisa (Beacon Falls CT)
Sweet Mandarin
"Sweet Mandarin" flows from the tale told by Helen Tse's great-grandfather of the elderly gentleman who proclaims to the people of his village that he will level two mountains to build a road south to the Han River. Although no one believes him capable of this feat, he insists the job will be completed, if not only by himself, but by generations to come. Through five generations, his descendants accomplish the task. Such is the story of the courageous women of Tse's family.
Tse's memoir is a tribute to the family matriarch and to the strength and passion of women. The central character of "Sweet Mandarin" is Lily, Tse's indomitable grandmother. Her tale takes the reader through the adversity of her early childhood in China, the prejudice she encounters during her youth in Hong Kong and finally to England. We meet Lily's stoic mother, Tai Po, who guides her family with love and courage. We meet Tse's own mother, Mabel, who rises from struggling to adjust to life in a new country to building a life of success through hard work. Finally, the Tse sisters themselves who achieve the dreams of their ancestors.
Although the author expresses the common thread uniting each of these extraordinary women to be the love of food and cooking, this reader was looking for more. "Lily's Chicken Curry" and "Mabel's Claypot Chicken" deserve more of a story!
"Sweet Mandarin" although not truly memorable, is a heartwarming, sweet memoir of how with love, hope, courage and determination, "mountains" can be moved.
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Liz (Kalamazoo MI)
Family and Food
Helen Tse has written a loving tribute to the women in her family in Sweet Mandarin. The greater part of the book tells her grandmother Lily’s story, and hers is a remarkable one. Beginning with her parent’s move to Hong Kong and her father’s death, Lily experiences both hardship and good fortune, and perseveres through it all.
Sweet Mandarin is a well written, compelling story about family, courage, determination, and making the most out of life. Tse’s fine prose makes the story read like a novel. The book spans over 75 years of family history in less than 300 pages, so there were parts of the story I wish had been covered in more detail. But, given that this is a memoir and not a novel, I felt Tse did an excellent job of remaining true to her family’s story as it was remembered. I only wish I could enjoy a meal of Lily’s signature Chicken Curry! Readers of Amy Tan and Diana Abu-Jaber (The Language of Baklava) will enjoy this book.
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Dorothy (Maynard MA)
To England from China by way of Hong Kong
I saw a quote once that said “Anyone who says you only have one life to live hasn’t learned to read.” Sweet Mandarin, a memoir by Helen Tse, shows just how far a book can take you into another life. Sweet Mandarin is the name of the restaurant Helen Tse and her two sisters opened in Manchester, England in 2004. It is one of a series of food related businesses her family owned, beginning with her grandfather’s soy sauce business and continuing through restaurants and take-aways owned by her grandmother and her parents. Her story following the importance of food to her family is billed as being about three generations of Chinese women. While it does talk about Helen’s life and that of her mother, this is really her grandmother Lily’s story. Born in a tiny primitive village in China to a family with no surviving sons and six daughters in a country where women have no status – legal or otherwise, Lily is determined not only to survive but to change and improve her life and the lives of her children. Demonstrating incredible courage and determination, she makes frighteningly difficult – sometimes heartbreaking - decisions to make sure that happens. The story of her life in China and in Hong Kong during the Japanese occupation during WWII is riveting. The cultural shock suffered when Lily comes to England brought to mind Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club. I found this an easy to read fascinating look at a very different and very difficult life.
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Trish (Portland OR)
Sweet Mandarin
I enjoyed reading Sweet Mandarin but would not add it to my list of favorite books to recommend. The story was somewhat predictable. Lily was an interesting character and I admired the strength that she and her family showed against great obstacles.
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Nona (Evanston IL)
Helen Tse, Sweet Mandarin
“I was taught a great deal of what it is to be a Chinese woman in the kitchen at my mother’s and grandmother’s sides. Cooking is at the heart of the Chinese family and for a Chinese woman it is at the very core of her identity.”
Helen Tse’s Sweet Mandarin tells the story of four generations of women in her family, though the great majority of the book concentrates on the life story of her grandmother Lily Kwok, the first to emigrate from Hong Kong to Manchester, UK where she opened the first of a series of restaurants owned by family members. The origins of the book and much of its content derive from family stories and rumors; one senses an unwillingness on the part of the author to delve into hard times or into topics that her family is shy to speak of (her grandmother, for example, is reluctant to speak of WWII; the narrative implies that she and her Dutch employers essentially collaborated with the Japanese in order to survive). This sensitivity (the people she writes about are mostly still alive) leads to a certain flatness and sense of incompleteness in the narrative. Curiously, this simplicity and detachment is even reflected when Tse speaks of what she has personally experienced—compare, for example, her description of experiencing Hong Kong for the first time with that of Martin Booth in Golden Boy: Memories of a Hong Kong Childhood. There is also a desire to view situations positively, though there is clearly ambivalence: one example is her father’s dedication to building his business and the consequent distance from his children while they were growing up; or her mother Mabel’s feeling that she (Mabel) had no childhood because of her responsibilities in Lily’s restaurant, a feeling echoed briefly by Helen about her own youth and then excused. This is an interesting story, made more so if the reader is in a position to compare it to other Asian American or Asian British memoirs, but in the end one comes away from the book feeling that one has only gained a surface knowledge of any of these individuals.
