Review by Miz P -- Mock My Words by Chandra Shekhar

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Miz P
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Latest Review: Mock My Words by Chandra Shekhar

Review by Miz P -- Mock My Words by Chandra Shekhar

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[Following is a volunteer review of "Mock My Words" by Chandra Shekhar.]
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2 out of 4 stars
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"Mock My Words" by Chandra Shekhar is an intimate look at cross-cultural marriage in the twenty-first century. Two alternating stories reveal the work pressures and personal stresses of the couple. Their significantly differing personalities are highlighted in their interactions with each others, their work contacts, and in their own self-knowledge.

Fundamental to Dan’s problems with others, he believes, is his inability to express himself clearly in English as Chinese is his first language. This weakness underlies and undermines his interactions with Americans. Further, he behaves in a passive, subservient manner with everyone in his life, rarely as an authentic person. In contrast, his wife Laura is sophisticated, hard-driving, and ambitious, able to clearly express herself whenever and however she wishes.

While I found the book to be well edited and the author to have a clear, concise, and logical writing style, I had little appreciation for the way the central theme of poor verbal expression was used. Dan’s slips and stumbles tended to be verb number and tense misuse. If his gaffes were intended to be humorous, they were not, nor were they clever malaprops. Often the mistakes were merely misuse of singular and plural verb forms and the errors were easy to overlook as the intent was still clear. This aspect of the book could have been developed more skillfully and made the book title more fitting: instead the mistakes became boring and were inconsequential to why he really had trouble communicating. His communication issues were more caused by his inability to ever express genuine feelings or to stand up for himself. It was mainly for this reason that I rated the book 2 out of 4 stars.

The basic story unfolded over a brief time frame, but referenced longstanding differences between the two. For example, the work Laura did on her primary project, as well as her methods of delegating and attacking the problems were exceptionally clearly and creatively described, demonstrating her competency. In contrast, Dan’s classroom difficulties were handled in ways that exposed his lack of creatively and absence of problem-solving skills. Thus, as the main character from whom the story is told, he was consistently unremarkable and generally helpless.

While the book was somewhat interesting, it was an example of very good skill in writing and less capable plotting and character development. To be clear: the plot is simple and flows logically. However, the writer shows greater ability than this simple story allows. He has the potential to create far more challenging material within a more complex story line and to devise a more complete array of fully developed characters. His word choice and sentence fluency suggest genuine expertise. Finally, the expectation of reading a novel is that some action or transformation takes place in the main character’s life. For Dan, changes occurred, but were almost totally through the actions of others: he led a life of reaction instead of action.

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Mock My Words
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Jlblawrence
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Post by Jlblawrence »

While I personally scored the novel higher, I do see where you are coming from. There were times in the book where I wasn't a fan of the plot, and other times where the characters came across as lacking. Overall, I was very impressed with the character development. But one such instance where I was unimpressed was the second to last phone with Laura. That scene to me was abrupt and unbelievable. But I've never been in that situation, so who's to say? Thank you for your honest opinion of the story!
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