Indonesia

The Birdwoman's Palate

Food is a window to the soul, and award-winning Indonesian author Laksmi Pamuntjak’s prose is as delicious as the dishes she describes. As Aruna, our frank and funny protagonist, discovers new flavors that awaken unknown truths within her, this lush and nourishing novel invites readers into Indonesia’s diverse mosaic of cuisines and cultures.

Aruna is an epidemiologist dedicated to food and avian politics. One is heaven, the other earth. The two passions blend in unexpected ways when Aruna is asked to research a handful of isolated bird flu cases reported across Indonesia. While it’s put a crimp in her aunt’s West Java farm, and made her own slow-roasted duck dish highly questionable, the investigation does provide an irresistible opportunity. It’s the perfect excuse to get away from corrupt and corrosive Jakarta and explore the spices of the far-flung regions of the islands with her three friends: a celebrity chef, a globe-trotting “foodist,” and her coworker, Farish.

From Medan to Surabaya, Palembang to Pontianak, the four have their fill of local cuisine. With every delicious dish, Aruna discovers a liberating new perspective on her country—and on her life—that will push her to pursue the things she’s only dreamed of doing.

“Pamuntjak’s second novel, The Birdwoman’s Palate, is her delicious love letter to the culinary world. The author, who made her name writing the bible of Jakarta’s food scene, takes us on a journey through the far-flung spots of the Indonesian archipelago, diving not just into the wealth of local cuisines but also the complexity of regional politics with her signature wit and wisdom.” —Yenni Kwok, Time Magazine

“Like Eat, Pray, Love and Without Reservations, The Birdwoman’s Palate offers generous portions of armchair travel and self-reflection, inspiring journeys both inward and outward.” —Gabriella Page-Fort"

Note: Currently free with Kindle Unlimited!

(Group read suggestion from Beth McCrea, book club co-founder.)

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Apple and Knife

Inspired by horror, myths, and fairy tales, Apple and Knife is an unsettling ride that swerves into the supernatural to explore the dangers and power of occupying a female body in today’s world.

These short works of fiction set in the Indonesian everyday—in corporate boardrooms, in shanty towns, on Javanese dangdut music stages—reveal a soupy otherworld stewing just beneath the surface. Sometimes wacky and always engrossing, this is subversive feminist horror at its best, where men and women alike are arbiters of fear, and where revenge is sometimes sweetest when delivered from the grave.

Mara finds herself brainstorming an ad campaign for Free Maxi Pads, with a little help from the menstruation-eating hag of her childhood. Jamal falls in love with the rich and powerful Bambang, but it is the era of Indonesia's “smiling general” and, if he’s not careful, he may find himself recruited to Bambang’s brutal cause. Solihin would give anything to make dangdut singer Salimah his wife—anything at all.

In the globally connected and fast-developing Indonesia of Apple and Knife, taboos, inversions, sex and death all come together in a heady, intoxicating mix full of pointed critiques and bloody mutilations. Women carve a place for themselves in this world, finding ways to subvert norms or enacting brutalities on themselves and each other.

“In Apple and Knife, Intan Paramaditha has turned the fairytale on its head. Instead of helpless maidens, these fables are bursting with fierce and fabulous females, determined to exact justice in an unjust world. As the enigmatic title suggests, the writing is juicy and incisive. Every story is a gem and, as with all good fairytales, there are important lessons to be learned.” —Melanie Cheng,

“Deliciously dark and expertly disturbing, Intan Paramaditha’s compelling Apple and Knife will haunt you. Her weird, original stories reveal the darkness behind old tales and the shadows lurking at the edges of modern life.” —Ryan O’Neill

(Group read suggestion from Julie Jacobs, book club moderator.)

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Man Tiger

Longlisted for the Man Booker International Prize 2016 & winner of the Financial Times Emerging Voices Fiction Award 2016

A wry, affecting tale set in a small town on the Indonesian coast, Man Tiger tells the story of two interlinked and tormented families and of Margio, a young man ordinary in all particulars except that he conceals within himself a supernatural female white tiger. The inequities and betrayals of family life coalesce around and torment this magical being. An explosive act of violence follows, and its mysterious cause is unraveled as events progress toward a heartbreaking revelation.

Lyrical and bawdy, experimental and political, this extraordinary novel announces the arrival of a powerful new voice on the global literary stage.

”Without a doubt the most original, imaginatively profound, and elegant writer of fiction in Indonesia today.” —Benedict Anderson

“A supernatural tale of murder and desire fascinatingly subverts the crime genre … Kurniawan’s writing demonstrates an affinity with literary heavyweights such as, yes, García Márquez and Dostoevsky.” —Guardian

“Brash, worldly and wickedly funny, Eka Kurniawan may be South-East Asia’s most ambitious writer in a generation... Eka is shaping up to be [Indonesia's] Murakami: approaching social concerns at an angle rather than head-on, with hefty doses of surrealism and wry humour.” —The Economist

(Group read suggestion from Gemma Ware, book club moderator.)

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The Rainbow Troops

From Indonesia, an inspiring, record-breaking bestseller—and a modern-day fairy tale

Published in Indonesia in 2005, The Rainbow Troops, Andrea Hirata's closely autobiographical debut novel, sold more than five million copies, shattering records. Now it promises to captivate audiences around the globe.

Ikal is a student at the poorest village school on the Indonesian island of Belitong, where graduating from sixth grade is considered remarkable. His school is under constant threat of closure. Ikal and his friends—a group nicknamed the Rainbow Troops—face threats from every angle: skeptical government officials, greedy corporations, deepening poverty, crumbling infrastructure, and their own low self-confidence.

But the students also have hope, which comes in the form of two extraordinary teachers, and Ikal's education in and out of the classroom is an uplifting one. We root for him as he defies the island's tin mine officials. We meet his first love, the unseen girl who sells chalk from behind a shop screen, whose pretty hands capture Ikal's heart. We cheer for Lintang, the class's barefoot math genius, as he bests the students of the mining corporation's school in an academic challenge. Above all, we gain an intimate acquaintance with the customs and people of the world's largest Muslim society.

This is classic storytelling in the spirit of Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner: an engrossing depiction of a milieu we have never encountered before, bursting with charm and verve.

“Hirata’s writing is as brilliant, beautiful, remarkable, and engrossing as the characters and the world he brings us. If you’ve ever been afraid to dream, or disbelieved in the true power of learning, read The Rainbow Troops and you’ll be changed by the two guardians and their small number of students, whose intelligence and vibrancy will intoxicate you. This is a treasure from one of the largest Muslim societies in the world.” —Ishmael Beah, author of A Long Way Gone

(Group read suggestion from Sue Attalla, book club moderator.)

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Saman

Saman is a story filtered through the lives of its feisty female protagonists and the enigmatic “hero” Saman. It is at once an exposé of the oppression of plantation workers in South Sumatra, a lyrical quest to understand the place of religion and spirituality in contemporary lives, a playful exploration of female sexuality and a story about love in all its guises, while touching on all of Indonesia's taboos: extramarital sex, political repression and the relationship between Christians and Muslims. Saman has taken the Indonesian literary world by storm, and is now available for the first time in English.

“Ayu Utami is a groundbreaking novelist, whose Saman (1998) is credited with ushering in a sea of change in the nation’s storytelling by daring to deal with sex and politics in a way that was previously off-limits for female authors. This shift is known as sastra wangi. with some people at the time anecdotally referring to the women writers in the movement as the ‘cliterati’.” —Ann Morgan

(A special thank you to book club members, Eydis West & Beth Cummings for the suggestion.)

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This Earth of Mankind

Set at the turn of the century in the waning days of Dutch colonial rule, This Earth of Mankind is the first of the four books that comprise Pramoedya Ananta Toer’s Buru Quartet. A powerful story of oppression, injustice, and one young man’s political, emotional, and intellectual awakening. Pramoedya Ananta Toer wrote This Earth of Mankind while confined on the prison island of Buru, where prisoners did hard labor, clearing jungle with the crudest tools, and suffered starvation diets, beatings, and torture. Much of Pramoedya’s work has in fact been written under such circumstances.

Minke is a young Javanese student of great intelligence and ambition. Living equally among the colonists and colonized of 19th-century Java, he battles against the confines of colonial strictures. It is his love for Annelies that enables him to find the strength to embrace his world.

(A special thank you to book club member, Jordi Valbuena for the suggestion.)

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