A 1989 best seller, Amy Tan's breakthrough novel, "The Joy Luck Club," was also a harbinger of the literature that would emerge from a "third wave" of postwar immigration to America.
While the earlier protagonists created by Philip Roth or Saul Bellow honed their ambitions toward assimilation and its material rewards, Tan's characters -- mostly female and frequently the victims of the revolutionary fervor that altered China -- responded to new realities by negotiating between the past and the present in a complicated game of chance.
Old rituals and patterns such as ancestral fealty, codes of honor, or political allegiances assumed new significance and meaning with each roll of the dice.
Tan's fifth novel is an ambitious one. Moving away from the dynamic of mother-daughter relationships, she uses a group kidnapping to highlight the political quagmire that characterizes contemporary Myanmar, formerly Burma.
Despite its subject, "Saving Fish" is in turn whimsical and irreverent. The title comes from a Buddhist belief that fish need to be rescued from the dangers of the sea.
Providentially, this also gave Burmese fishermen an excuse to eat their catch. Likewise, Tan has developed the confidence to play with ambiguities as they present themselves.
As the novel begins, Bibi Chi is a 63-year old socialite and shop owner from San Francisco who has organized a tour to China and Myanmar called "Following in the Buddha's Footsteps."
But, as she prepares to lead a dozen men and women into Asia, she dies suddenly, and her remains are found in her shop window. Undeterred, the party embarks without her.
A dead narrator is tricky. On the one hand, a supernatural spirit is a godsend. Omniscient, they have the freedom to move from one character's viewpoint to the next seamlessly. The dead can offer unsolicited advice on any subject, and provide historical background if needed.
On the other hand, being dead presents its own set of problems. Since her fate has already been cast, the narrator is not duly affected by the unfolding events, and it takes considerable storytelling skill to push pass the inertia of death and make readers care about the plot.
Like many of Tan's characters, Bibi had suffered enormous personal loss, and we are introduced to her past before we meet our travelers. Her prior trauma imparts great wisdom, a wide store of knowledge and acute insight into human nature.
Even better, she has the dirt on everyone, including Harry, a TV personality whose knowledge of canine behavior comes in handy when one of his compatriots smuggles a small dog into China.
I've never been on an organized tour, but I imagine it's a lot like the trip described here. The drama unfolds slowly, and since we already know that 11 of the 12 will be abducted while watching a sunrise, we are left with side excursions. Tan writes a series of interesting, anecdotal stories, but we spend way too much time on the bus.
And as the dead always seem to, Bibi condescends to the living for so long that when the group gets shanghaied, it's a bit of a relief. Had Bibi been alive, we might have cared. Dead, she gets annoying, particularly in her cheap shots at boorish tourists.
The ugly American is a literary cliche, and Tan is too smart to take such easy aim.
Nevertheless, the novel has all the elements that I admire in Tan's writing -- poetic language, exotic locations, quirky characters, intrigue, mystery, sex and death.
On balance, she is a bold and challenging writer. Her characters are complex and distinctive. "Saving Fish From Drowning" is disconnected, but it's still a strange and fascinating trip, which I imagine a tour called "Following in the Buddha's Steps" should be.
A live tour guide might have made all the difference.
"Saving Fish From Drowning"By Amy Tan
Putnam ($26.95)
First Published: January 15, 2006, 5:00 a.m.
