A review by just_one_more_paige
Swimming Back to Trout River by Linda Rui Feng

emotional reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

 
My second to last of the 2022 Aspen Words longlist books! I brought this one on a trip with me and almost finished it on a single flight from Denver to Raleigh; once I started it, I just couldn't stop. Also, if we're keeping track, this is another one (which at this point is at least half of the reads) that I would not have picked up without them appearing on this longlist. So, my gratitude to the exposure this reading challenge is giving me remains strong. 
 
 In Swimming Back to Trout River, we follow a few main characters as they navigate recent history in China (including survival of the Cultural Revolution) and immigration to the United States in a variety of ways. Dawn is a musician who must give up the violin to survive the attack on arts and the bourgeois within China. Momo embraces the changes communism brings, at least to start, which causes a lifelong rift between himself and his college friend, Dawn. Cassia is struggling to deal with a traumatic personal experience, leaving Beijing to get away from the memories as soon as she could. Junie is Momo and Cassia' daughter, born in the late 1970s and mostly raised by her grandparents, after her parents' immigration to the United States. But Junie's life faces some major (unwanted) changes when a letter arrives informing her that her family will be brought together again, in America, to celebrate her 12th birthday. This novel unfolds these four stories, interwoven together, until the conclusion where we see how they all, in finale, intersect. 
 
So first, like I said, once I got into this book, the story-telling just carried me along with it. I was swept up by the characters and their individual developments, which all felt very fully dimensional, considering that this isn't a very long novel. Momo and Cassia take center stage, as they are developed both as individuals and as parents, but Dawn is almost equally central, and Junie holds as much space as a sheltered 12-year-old can. Basically, my point is, the character development is wonderful. Along with that, I was subtly blown away by the story itself. As I was reading, I was just moving along with the storytelling, which had a very understated vibe to it. But after finishing, and sitting with my immediate thoughts/reactions, I realized that there was a very impressive depth of humanity in these pages, unearthed and brought to the light, that I didn't even fully register until after it was over. The intermingling of memories of the past, the choices in the present, and the interplay of those realities on the way a life unfolds, is an affecting framework of this story. 
 
I loved the look at the power of art (specifically music) and the way that it inspires and gives purpose and connects people in a way that nothing else can imitate. It is a touchstone, a cornerstone, of culture across generations and space and I love the way it endured throughout this novel, even in the places where all efforts were put not only into ignoring it, but actively quashing it. As my partner always says, the art is what is remembered about past civilizations, more than anything else it is what leaves an indelible mark. I also loved, and this harkens back to my earlier point about the understated tone of the writing, the many kinds of courage and following dreams that don’t make always make as big a splash as far as a dramatic telling, but still are life-changing, routine shattering, extraordinary, for those who act on them. Feng writes, so meticulously, the way these decisions render the characters both recognizable and completely foreign unto themselves, their ideas of who they are and their expectations of who they would be. This is such a universal pattern/ truth and it's so recognizable, despite how different these characters' lives may seem. 
 
I have a few other random thoughts that I'm just gonna collect here at the end. There was physical disability rep that I have never seen on-page before, with a really interesting way of adapting, based on the setting (rural China). A beautiful take, one that I am going to work to internalize, that Feng wrote on this topic, was along these lines: without the rest of us (looking differently from her), she’d never know anything was missing. I mean, what a way to reframe disability (a deeply needed and necessary way). This was also the second AAPI-authored novel that mentions the idea of "yuanfen," the sort of universe-guided connections between people, that I've read in the past couple months. The other, if I am remembering correctly, was Beasts of a Little Land. And it's a concept that I really appreciate because truly there are so many times in real life that connections appear that would almost seem overdone/cheesy in fiction, so reading examples of this cultural explanation for it was really cool. Finally, my two iffy spots. First, I can't decide how I felt about the foreshadowing of Junie's (seemingly big) future, without ever getting any fulfillment on details. I'm not against it, I just can't decide if I'm unsatisfied in a good literary way or in an actually unfinished way. Second, the end of Momo and Cassia’s story. I won't give spoilers, becasue it's a big one, but I just felt like it was too fast/abrupt for the rest of the writing style. I wish a similar endpoint could have been reached with a plot point that better fit the vibe. 
 
Overall, this was such a quietly and tenderly handled telling, considering the amount of grief and trauma that it covered (on this note, I have to mention the content warnings for loss of a child and accidental-injury death, as well as the generall repressive regime of Mao's China). I sped through the compelling and nicely paced story and, while it's not a favorite of the 2022 longlist bunch, it is a very solid addition and deserved the spot and recognition. If you are looking for a well-balanced, multi-POV, character-developed novel, with an insight into finding your place in unforgiving/unaccepting worlds, the connective power of music, and a bit of family drama, then I would definitely recommend this one.  
 
“After all, wasn't it true that to love someone is to figure out how to tell yourself their story?” (I noted this one right away, when I started reading and then it was actually especially mentioned in the author's acknowledgements.) 
 
“It didn’t occur to her that he might have been lonely, and that sometimes the lonely used things to fill up the space vacated by people.” 
 
“In physics, there were always boundary conditions, and you could understand a great deal about a problem by thinking of its two extremes. Music, it seemed to him, lacked such boundaries. One could go on and on in any one direction without ever coming back.” 
 
“He was impatient for time to pass, so that in his life, there would be less yearning and more having, less becoming and more being.” 

 “It’s in our nature to give things value, and there are times [...] when we have to give these things up in order to stay whole, in order to keep going.” 
 
“But there are certain decisions that seem so right in retrospect that they irreversibly erase thoughts that any alternatives ever existed.” 
 
“She knew that the universe had a way of surprising you with its murkier logic. In this logic, you could give birth to one child and end up raising another. As atonement. Or remuneration. Or however that otherworldly accounting worked.” 
 
“Vocabularies we’re simply impoverished when it came to obscure sorrows.” 
 
“How strange was the ebb and flow of resilience in the space between two people!” 
 
“He knew he was sometimes driven to hopes that were the wrong size for this world.” 
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