you are eating an orange. you are naked. by sheung-king

after years of brainrot, I attempted to get back into reading books again in 2024 like a baby deer learning how to walk. I picked up this book because the title and synopsis intrigued me, and it’s safe to say I got thrown off the deep end.

the novel is about 2 financially well off lovers in their 20’s, frequent flyers from toronto to asia to europe, spanning years of what I can only describe as the type of on-and-off situationship that makes you physically ill with confusion and longing. this novel is labyrinthine in that it is filled with folk tales the couple exchanges throughout their travels and encounters, and personal anecdotes of the main character that seamlessly overlay each other to a point where I wasn’t sure at times where reality and myth started and ended.

the liminal spaces of the airports, cities and time zones they temporarily stay in reflect directly on the liminality of their relationship and the absurdity of avoiding words they say only with their eyes. as someone not as well travelled or financially comfortable, I loved peeking into the lifestyle that seems so perfect on the screens I use to scroll. but in doing so, I experienced so much sonder and loneliness with the atmosphere sheung-king painted.

while it is a novel, I knew it was written from a place of truth, excavating the political and societal tensions that define identity. a person whose home exists in multiple places that are thousands of miles apart, and searching for home in people who may be just as far, or right in front of you, and just as impossible to reach. it was lowkey gut wrenching, and while the book was beautiful, it was bittersweet when I turned the last page and realized it was over.

if you like surrealist storytelling, dreamy reflective prose, folk tales, and travel, I think this novel is a poetic merging of it all, and by an asian canadian author!!