By Lauren Bell
“Everyone in Orange County’s Little Saigon knew the Duong sisters were cursed.” So begins The Fortunes of Jaded Women by Carolyn Huynh. Enter Mai, the latest tragedy of the Duong family curse. At 65, she’s not expecting much from her yearly meeting with her Kaua‘i psychic, yet at this appointment she leaves with an unexpected prophecy: this year there will be a birth in the family, a marriage, and a funeral, if she can fix the damaged relationships with everyone in her family. What makes this fortune all the more desirable is that the baby born will be a boy—meaning the end of the Duong generational curse, where the Duong women only give birth to daughters, and none know love or happiness. But what makes this prediction bittersweet is that Mai has been estranged from her two sisters and mother for ten years, and that her three daughters each harbour a deep resentment towards her. Thus begins the difficult path of Mai’s reconciliation. Naturally, there is a funeral, a birth, and a wedding; however, they do not play out in the ways imagined.
Told in third person, each chapter shares a perspective from one woman in the family, showing what their current life looks like and how their strained relationships to each other have affected it. Essentially, the Duong women are all very similar—fiery, stubborn, and passionate (what society might call “difficult,” but these are the traits that made me love and root for the characters), enhancing Huynh’s strong feminist voice that underlies the novel. I found The Fortunes of Jaded Women to be very reminiscent of Crazy Rich Asians, with the Duong family being the central, complicated, overly involved, but fiercely protective family. However, the roots of superstition and the unique commentary on identity, immigration, upward mobility, and biracial relationships set it apart from Kwan’s. This is what makes The Fortunes of Jaded Women such a valuable read: in between the pages of satire, Huynh still finds space to discuss serious topics.
Moreover, Huynh describes these experiences in such a way that can provoke empathy in readers of all backgrounds. I found Huynh did a good job of capturing the voices of each character at each point in their lives, despite differences in age and values. The scenes of housewife/reality TV show-style arguments between the family members, I think, were the peak of Huynh’s writing, as reading them made me feel as if I really was in the midst of the chaos. I read this book within two days, despite it being an averaged sized novel—which I think speaks to the plot’s allure. I would highly recommend this read.
Thank you to Simon & Schuster Canada for the complimentary copy in exchange for an honest review.