The Piano Teacher: A Novel
Written by Janice Y. K. Lee
Narrated by Orlagh Cassidy
3.5/5
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Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this audiobook
"A rare and exquisite story . . . Transports you out of time, out of place, into a world you can feel on your very skin." -Elizabeth Gilbert
Janice Y.K. Lee's latest novel, The Expatriates, is now available from Penguin
The New York Times bestseller
In the sweeping tradition of The English Patient, Janice Y.K. Lee's debut novel is a tale of love and betrayal set in war-torn Hong Kong. In 1942, Englishman Will Truesdale falls headlong into a passionate relationship with Trudy Liang, a beautiful Eurasian socialite. But their affair is soon threatened by the invasion of the Japanese as World War II overwhelms their part of the world. Ten years later, Claire Pendleton comes to Hong Kong to work as a piano teacher and also begins a fateful affair. As the threads of this spellbinding novel intertwine, impossible choices emerge-between love and safety, courage and survival, the present, and above all, the past.
Janice Y. K. Lee
Janice Y.K. Lee graduated from Harvard University. She worked as a features editor at 'Elle' and 'Mirabella' magazines in New York before becoming a full-time writier. A Korean-American, she currently lives in Hong Kong with her family.
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Reviews for The Piano Teacher
639 ratings74 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5As many readers have noted, this book starts out as a pleasant story, alternating between high society in 1940's Hong Kong, and 1950's Hong Kong. Not very interesting, but then everything changes as war starts in 1941, and when it has ended in the 50's. Lee's story puts us right in the action, you read about a very different wartime experience, and this is a tale that weaves and unwinds credibly!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5One of the many things I enjoy about receiving books to review is the feeling I get walking into a bookstore after a release and being able to point and say, "Hey, I've read that!" Such was the case recently with The Piano Teacher, Janice Y. K. Lee's debut novel, which was not only prominently featured but was the store's top seller in fiction. The book has received generally favorable reviews, especially for a first novel, and it's now time to add mine into the mix. The Piano Teacher examines Hong Kong during World War II and it's aftermath, particularly looking at the people living there and how their lives were impacted by the Japanese invasion of the area. The Second World War has always been a topic of great interest for me, but I am much more familiar with the events on the European front than everything that was happening in Asia, and I know very little about Hong Kong at all. So, I happily accepted a copy of The Piano Teacher for review.In 1951, Claire Pendleton, an English newlywed, followed her husband to Hong Kong. Surprisingly, she easily adapted to her new environment, though she was a little out of her depth when it came to the expatriate community's social life. Then she met Will Truesdale and found herself falling in love. But like so many others still living in Hong Kong, Will's past is devastating. Arriving shortly before the Japanese invasion in 1941, Will soon became involved with Trudy Liang, a beautiful Eurasian socialite. But the war changes everything. Will is sent to an internment camp while Trudy remains on the outside, both struggling to do what they can to survive.For me, the best parts of The Piano Teacher were the evocative portrayal of Hong Kong and Lee's marvelous prose style, particularly her use of the present tense when describing past events. I found this technique to have been executed extremely well (it's very hard to do convincingly!) and it was extraordinarily effective in conveying just how important that tragic time period was for the people who lived through it and how it continues to affect them a decade later. The book is definitely more about people and how they change in order to survive than it is about plot. One does exist, but it feels almost like a sidenote. Lee's characters are very realistic, but I must admit that I never really cared for any of them on a personal level. I didn't actively dislike them, but they weren't the sort of people I could really connect with; I felt more like an observer and didn't have much sense of being invested in the story.Overall, I enjoyed The Piano Teacher even if I wasn't blown away by it. The writing is beautifully done, the two story-lines playing off of each other very nicely. Lee captures the vibrancy of Hong Kong in the 1940s and '50s to the extent that it almost becomes its own character in the novel. The plot is almost nonexistent as what is important to the story are the characters and their relationships to one another. War is a terrible thing and sacrifices and decisions must be made in the name of survival, but afterwards those choices will have to be lived with. Lee understands this and her characters show it. The Piano Teacher makes for an impressive debut. And while the book didn't quite work for me because I felt so detached from the characters, Lee's work shows great promise and I enjoyed her style immensely.Experiments in Reading
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Started out slowly and gracelessly--I kept reading only because it was the selection for my book club--but it got exciting toward the end. One of those books I can't remember two week after I finished it. I did care about Trudy. She was an interesting character.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Exotic Hong Kong takes center stage in this sumptuous novel, set in the 1940s and '50s. It's a city teeming with people, sights, sounds, and smells, and it's home to a group of foreign nationals who enjoy the good life among the local moneyed set, in a tight-knit social enclave distanced from the culture at large. Comfortable, clever, and even a bit dazzling, they revel in their fancy dinners and fun parties. But their sheltered lives take an abrupt turn after the Japanese occupation, and though their reactions are varied -- denial, resistance, submission -- the toll it takes on all is soon laid bare. Enter Claire Pendleton from London. Months after her husband is transferred to Hong Kong in 1951, she accepts a position as a piano teacher to the daughter of a wealthy couple, the Chens. Claire begins to see the appeal of the sweltering city and is soon taken in by the Chen's driver, the curiously underutilized Will Truesdale. A handsome charmer with a mysterious limp, Will appears to be the perfect companion for Claire, who's often left to her own devices. But a further examination leaves her with more questions than answers.An intricately woven tale of lives changed by historical events, Lee's debut brings this hothouse flower of a city alive with passion, and imagines characters both unforgettable and tragic.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I didn't enjoy this novel as I thought I would. The story line continually went from present day to the past, and from character to character, making it difficult to follow. The characters' personalities didn't appeal to me so they didn't draw me into the storyline.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Piano Teacher by Janice Y K Lee is a beautifully written novel. Part love story, part war story it tells the story of two main characters, Will and Claire. The story stretches across ten years and starts in 1942 with Will's love affair with Trudy, a Eurasian socialite. Ten years later Will meets Claire and they embark upon an affair, only for the secrets of his past to impact upon them.
It's wonderfully written and the words really flow well. I was wary about the content originally but once I began reading I found it very easy to get into and follow. The characters, though not always likeable, are realistic (and realistically flawed). Although I can't profess to being very knowledgable about Hong Kong's history, the story seemed to flow well and the events all seemed tangible.
This was a very enjoyable and moving read of two quite different love affairs set within a decade of one another and a story of how it isn't always possible to bury one's own history. Very enjoyable. - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Didn't know what I would think of this but I quite enjoyed it. Glimpses of HK during and after WW2 the most interesting aspects of this. Didn't particularly care for the main characters. An easy read.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This book really isn't my style - its slow, ponderous, full of unlikeable people. The part I found most interesting was the description of the refugee camp because I hadn't realized that Hong Kong was invaded by the Japanese. I found the the motives of the various characters weren't explained. I found Claire, the main character to be the worst of them all - she suddenly starts stealing from her employer, and the book doesn't really explain why. As for her romance with Will Truevale (or something), Will is so bland. He doesn't really have much of a personality. As for Trudy, she is actually the one character I kind of liked - but, again, it felt like she was written in grayscale, rather than in color. I didn't like this book. But, its I wouldn't have read it except that it was chosen by my book club.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5This is the story of life in Hong Kong during and after WWII. A story of an English wife and a culture that gives her options. Claire comes to Hong Kong as a lily white, sheltered, rich little girl. She falls into a job as a piano teacher for an equally spoiled little girl in a very wealthy Hong Kong family - a family with a checkered war past. Out of boredom she begins pocketing trinkets from the family - including a bottle of perfume.It is that scent that eventually connects her to Will Truesdale - a man of an unknown past but who holds the story of life during the war and a connection to famed Trudy - the woman who first used the perfume Claire found.This story tells the horrible truth of living in a war torn country and trying to continue with life. People stoop to unexpected lows and climb to incredible heights to continue. Interesting read
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5It took me a while to get into this book, but I felt in the last half the narrative really improved and become much more compelling (the onset of WWII may have helped). I enjoyed seeing how the characters' lives were revealed to be ever more intertwined, although I was disappointed with some of the ambiguity of a few characters' fates. This is a good read, and one I would certainly recommend to someone interested in China of this period.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5All's unfair in love + war; so goes the theme of this WWII novel set in Hong Kong during the horror of the Japanese invasion. The characters - Trudy, a gorgeous Portuguese-Chinese woman, her Brit lover Will, and Claire, a Brit bride who arrives in the Colony 10 years after the war - are very well developed and the plot, told in dual time frames and from Will and Claire's viewpoints, is always commanding. But adding Trudy's thoughts would have made it even better, rather than leaving her as a bit too enigmatic. It reminded me a bit of Love is a Many Splendored Thing, but much less mushy. Lee's immersion in Hong Kong history and life (also seen in her latest, The Expatriates) paint a picture of a locale to be treasured for all the nationalities, social classes, and cuisine (!) it embraces.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Interesting account of post-war Hong Kong. Trudy was an interesting character and her romance was absorbing, but there was no real resolution and some of the characters were unbelievable. However, I did learn much about the Japanese atrocities against the Chinese during the War.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Similar story as her most recent book, "The Expatriates" and just as pleasurable. She has great capacity in intertwining stories from past and present.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Sad, sad story, but taught me a lot about a period/location of which I knew very little.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5i like the atmosphere in this book. having two stories with some of the sma epeople 10 years apart. amazing how much people change over time and in crisis situations. thr ending was not as exciting as i hoped for when behaviors were explained, but i liked - spoiler alert - that claire went her own way to find herself.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The book takes place in two time periods a decade apart. It is the story of Claire and Trudy, two women and two different circumstances. The period is World War 2 in Hong Kong. The events that take place, the changes that happen, the growth of the characters make for a very moving story.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Set in Hong Kong in two time periods—1952 and leading up to the Japanese invasion in 1941—this lovely debut novel is part romance, part mystery, and part sociological study of the behavior of an expat community in good times and very very bad ones. The 1952 story begins with newly arrived Claire Pendleton, wife of a water engineer who’s mostly away and mostly ignores her. Claire’s a bit bored and lets it be known she’s offering piano lessons. She’s hired by a prominent Chinese family, Melody and Victor Chen to teach their ten-year-old daughter Locket. With the Chens, she comes to know temptation.On the street and at practically every social event she attends, she runs into a long-time Hong Kong resident, the emotionally elusive Englishman Will Truesdale. He has an odd limp and an confident manner, and he pursues Claire with determination. Over time, she learns his history and the preoccupations that haunt him.In 1941, Truesdale was the Hong Kong newcomer. Almost immediately he meets and falls for Eurasian beauty Trudy Liang, a fixture in the social scene and cousin of Melody Chen. Will and Trudy’s love affair changes them both. Then the Japanese overwhelm the colony, bringing their detention camps, their bombs, their random, brutal murders, and deep, starvation-level privation. Choices were made, and those long-ago choices shape Claire’s world too.Having shown the glitter of Hong Kong, Lee now exposes the grime. She reveals the aspects of character that allow individuals to survive changed circumstances, or not. The ones who come out the other side, like Claire, who needed to believe there was more to life, learn who they truly are.The plot is strong and the prose elegant. Lee carries you along so easily that before you know it, you are plunged into difficulty all around. Her vivid description of the city of Hong Kong and the life there is like a prolonged, unforgettable visit to an exotic, insular world.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Audio book narrated by Orlagh Cassidy
3.5***
Summary info from the dust jacket: In 1942, Will Truesdale, an Englishman newly arrived in Hong Kong, falls headlong into a passionate relationship with Trudy Liang, a beautiful Eurasian socialite. But their love affair is soon threatened by the invasion of the Japanese, with terrible consequences for both of them and for members of their fragile community, who will betray one another in the darkest days of the war.
Ten years later, Claire Pendleton comes to Hong Kong and is hired by the wealthy Chen family as their daughter’s piano teacher. A provincial English newlywed, Claire is seduced by the colony’s heady social life. She soon begins an affair … only to discover that her lover’s enigmatic demeanor hides a devastating past.
My reactions/observations
I’ll admit that I was expecting a lighter chick-lit type of historical romance, but I was pleasantly surprised by the added depth to this story. Once again I found myself reading a book with dual time lines, and alternating stories; the book begins with Claire’s arrival in Hong Kong in 1952, then transitions to January 1941 where we are introduced to Trudy. For several chapters the timeline alternates, then we spend a considerable amount of time in WW2 as the Japanese take control of Hong Kong, evacuating non-Chinese residents to “safe havens” which are really POW camps. Part three returns us to Claire’s story as she begins to piece together what really happened and how the people she has met were connected.
I seem to be reading quite a few novels lately that have dual timelines, which is a difficult writing device to handle well. Lee does a pretty good job, especially for a debut novel. Leading each chapter with a date certainly helps the reader keep the timelines straight. It does take several chapters before we make the first connection between the two stories, but I was quickly caught up in these interwoven tales of love, loss, secrecy and betrayal. Claire reminds me of The Painted Veil’s Kitty Fane, though she isn’t drawn quite so fully as Maugham’s character. Will Truesdale is almost as puzzling to me as he is to Claire, but I rather like that Lee left the reader to discover him rather than spell everything out. I certainly didn’t see the revelation towards the end coming. The writing is evocative of time and place; I’ve visited Hong Kong several times (while it was still a British Colony), and can easily picture the settings, the oppressive heat and humidity, and the “aliveness” of the markets. This is Lee’s debut, and I would certainly read another novel by her.
Orlagh Cassidy does a fine job of narrating the audio version. Her pacing is good, and I had no trouble keeping the characters or the timelines straight. - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5It took me some time to become comfortable with the two timelines and their tenses. Once I had a better grasp of the plot, its complexity kept me interested.The Piano Teacher had all the elements of a good novel including sophisticated prose. Halfway through,however, I checked to see whether the story had been turned into a movie. The drama and extravagance would work well cinematographically. I usually finish a book before considering a film version, but I wanted to see how certain characters evolved. I couldn’t find a movie based on the novel, but finished the book regardless. I say this because the characters were not very endearing to me. In fact if the book had not been so well written and the mystery so interesting, I probably would have put it down.I also have to admit that the setting was fascinating, as I had very limited knowledge of the Japanese occupation of Honk Kong. Some parts were very disturbing, but not out of place where war is concerned.What really made it difficult for me to enjoy the book was that I just didn’t like any of the characters, and would not have wanted anything to do with them, had they been real people. The only character I sympathized with was Locket, whom we don’t get to know very well as readers. I guess what was missing for me was some feeling of satisfaction beyond having the mystery revealed. Hope.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Really enjoyed this novel...it had romance, exotic location, mystery, characters, intrigue, suspense, history.., just my "cup of tea." I didn't want the book to end.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5It started off a bit too slow for my liking and not much happened until the last one hundred or so pages, which were fantastic, especially when read whilst listening to the 'Lust, Caution' score.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Don't judge a book by its cover!On the surface, this is a romance novel about a man’s One Great Love that can’t withstand the rigours of the war, and a less than great affair with a married piano teacher. Underneath that surface lies a cleverly constructed mystery about a beautiful socialite who disappears during the war and the people responsible, directly and indirectly, for her death.Some of the characters grow rich, stay safe, become successful, others are interned, tortured and die – and it's rarely the people you expect, there’s a surprise in almost every chapter. No one is who or what they seemed to be at the start. A great many dirty secrets are revealed, many lives ruined, some vindicated and some - you never do find out what happened. Rich and poor, they just disappear. The brutality of the Japanese occupation is not glossed over. This is not a story for the squeamish.The book’s cover – distinctly Mills and Boon – didn’t fill me with much in the way of anticipation, I was expecting a weak and slushy romance in an exotic setting. I was wrong. The setting and the characters are palpable, real and perfectly drawn; the plot compelling and intriguing. Highly recommended
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The book is much like a song that, with a good hook and an interesting rhythm, starts to unravel in the end because the writer doesn't know how to finish it. The characters are very well drawn out, sympathetic and believable to a fault. The plot was folded over and over again, with turns and cliffhangers that were well thought out and satisfying. The ending, though, has the feel of the end of an old pair of jeans, unraveling and frayed. I have been saying that it was a lot like Gone With the Wind but set in Hong Kong during WWII. And this still carries forward. I doubt that GWTW had a satisfying ending either, from what I have heard from other people. It is also very similar to _Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet_, but that book was much better, with an ending that worked. The one element of the ending that I did like was that, in the end, Claire decided to keep on living, to embrace Hong Kong for what it was. She tended her gardens, as Voltaire described the characters at the end of Candide. We must go on living, even after the drama and the heartache. The simplicity in which Claire did this worked amazingly well. What happened to Will, I do not know. His life is revealed more in dreams and thoughts, and his fate is unknown. But I think he would have had to live his life as well. I think we all would like to have a small apartment, to live as Claire did, and be absorbed into the life of the everyday. It is the Romance of the mundane that makes life interesting. It's what most celebrities miss after their quarter hour of fame ends, or after a child star ceases to be a child. The blending in of life to life is something that never quite is accomplished. It all comes down to acceptance.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The novel was set in Hong Kong just before, during and after the Japanese invasion during WWII. The novel went back and forth between these two times in order to delay our complete understanding of the main characters and their actions. The main characters are Claire, the piano teacher, Will, the main male protagonist, and Trudy, Will's love interest, and the most complex and interesting character in the book. Good character development including minor characters, and explores an interesting period of history which is not often mentioned.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I think I've mentioned it before, but I'm not the biggest fan of audio books. This has nothing to do with the media and everything to do with my attention span. I'm easily distracted. I'll be listening and suddenly it's five minutes later and I have no idea what was just said. With a print book it's much easier for me to focus. However, I've been trying a new system: I'll listen to an audio book at bedtime to get my mind off the events of the day and into a story. This actually has been working quite well and if I keep it up, I just might be able to reach my goal of 50 books this year.One of the books I recently listened to was The Piano Teacher by Janice Y. K. Lee. Set in Hong Kong in the 1940s and '50s, the story centers around two main characters and how their lives intersect. It's about how our own personal history, as well as the historical events in which we live through, defines and shapes who we are and our relationships.More specifically, it is a tale centered around Claire Pendleton, a newlywed recently transferred to Hong Kong, and the affair she begins with Will Truesdale. Both hired by the same family, they must keep their affair quiet, but secrets from Will's past keep surfacing. She begins to learn of the connection between Will and her employers, and of a mysterious woman in Will's past. WWII changed many lives, especially those in Hong Kong, but until she met Will, Claire never knew just how much had changed.I had high hopes for this novel, but ultimately I was disappointed. Hong Kong seemed nothing more than a high-society luncheon for the rich and popular. The setting could just as easily have been London for the first part of the book. It wasn't until the war actually hit that it made sense why Lee set the novel in this town. Lee goes back and forth between the 1940s war-era and the 1950s post-war era. This was actually a great tool because I was able to learn more information about Will's past than had the novel simply been following Claire. That being said, Claire was a vapid character. She had no depth, and there seemed to be no real need of her character other than a machination to continue the real story - that of Will and Trudy, his lover during the war. The events post-war (which I won't go into so I don't spoil it) would have taken place whether or not Claire had been there. She wasn't the catalyst, and therefore I saw no real point to her character.So, really, I half liked this book. I really liked Will's story and was interested in what happened to him and the other foreign-nationals during the war. But as for the 1950s part of the novel, I really didn't care until the end, and even then it was just so I could learn what really happened to Trudy. 3 out of 5 stars for a good concept and different look at WWII, but a boring and somewhat useless main character.Oh, and I actually really liked Orlagh Cassidy's reading of the novel. I'm pretty picky on narrators, but she kept me interested and had a pleasant voice. So if you want to try the audio book, I'd recommend that route.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The author made real the years of the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, the years of colonialism leading up to that time, and the aftermath. As far as a picture of the time – 1940s and early 1950s Hong Kong – I thought it well done. None of the characters were likeable, though, and the story started off in such a strange way, that I almost gave it up before getting to the historical part of this fiction.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This story is set in Hong Kong in the 1940s and 1950s, which is a place and time I don't know much about. It tells the story of two affairs; one between an Englishman and a Eurasian woman on the eve of World War II, and the other between an married American woman and an Englishman. I didn't know anything about the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong and actually ended up doing a bit of research online so I'd have a better understanding of the events. While I did enjoy it, I felt some of the characters were not developed as much as I would have liked. Despite that it was a fascinating look at a society I knew nothing about.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This book interweaves two story-lines in WWII era and 1950s Hong Kong, touching on every sort of class, race, and gender issue you can think of. I had never considered the fate of Hong Kong during the war-- as a British colony, it was fully occupied by the Japanese, and any British, American, or other Ally citizens who didn't leave in time were kept in an internment camp (queue requisite poor living conditions, abuse, human behavior when reduced to a less-than-comfortable lifestyle). At the same time, there was an entire class of wealthy Chinese, very British in culture, suddenly stuck between a sort of removed patriotism, class loyalty, and Asian identity. It's a really interesting portrayal of how we all survive, identify ourselves, relate to same and other. Or rather, how we would if faced with unique circumstances and options. Also great character development, and strong female characters. I kept thinking about each 'I don't know if I like her, do I like her?,' because each is so interesting, very magnetic or charismatic in a way, but they are also real, flawed, screwed up. They are confident but confused, kind but mean, selfish and selfless, impressive and disappointing, glamorous but ordinary. Like me, like all of us. And, above all, malleable. They learn, they improve, they fail themselves and others, but they also rise to certain occasions. I like that.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Interesting story regarding the occupation of Hong Kong during the Second World War. The story flucuates between 1952 and back to the occupation of the 40's. The historical situations were interesting enough but I never could get enthralled about the main characters. Some of the secondary characters were actually of more interest. O.K. read but not my favorite.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Didn't care much about the main character. Sort of snore of a book club book in my mind.