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Empire of Glass Paperback – June 20, 2017

by Kaitlin Solimine (Author)

4.8 59 ratings

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Short-listed for the Center for Fiction's 2017 First Novel Prize, Empire of Glass is a grand, experimental epic chronicling the seismic changes in China over the last half century.
In the mid-1990s, an American teenager, named Lao K in Chinese, stands on Coal Hill, a park in Beijing, a loop of rope in her hand. Will she assist her Chinese homestay mother, Li-Ming, who is dying of cancer, in ending her life, or will she choose another path? Twenty years later, Lao K receives a book written by Li-Ming called "Empire of Glass," a narrative that chronicles the lives of Li-Ming and her husband, Wang, in pre and post-revolutionary China over the last half of the twentieth century. Lao K begins translating the story, which becomes the novel we are reading. But, as translator, how can Lao K separate fact from fiction, and what will her role be in the book's final chapter?
A grand, experimental epic--Lao K's story is told in footnotes that run throughout the book--that chronicles the seismic changes in China over the last half century through the lens of one family's experiences, Empire of Glass is an investigation into the workings of human memory and the veracity of oral history that pushes the boundaries of language and form in stunning and unforgettable ways.
Kaitlin Solimine has been a Fulbright Fellow in China, and has received several scholarships, awards, and residencies for her writing, including the 2012 Dzanc Books/Disquiet International Literary Program award for an earlier draft of Empire of Glass, judged by Colson Whitehead. Her fiction has been published in Guernica, Kartika Review, and numerous anthologies. Kaitlin is co-founder of Hippo Reads, a network connecting academic insights and scholars to the wider public. She resides in San Francisco with her husband and daughter, where she was a 2016 SF Grotto Writing Fellow and is associate producer of the childbirth documentary, Of Woman Born.

Print length

304 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Ig Publishing
Publication date

June 20, 2017
Dimensions

5.5 x 1 x 8.5 inches
ISBN-10

1632460556
ISBN-13

978-1632460554
See all details

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A bold and luminous book, a novel that captures the great upheavals of history and the smallest fissures in family life with equal attention, intimacy, and insight." - National Book Award and PEN/Faulkner Finalist, Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum

"Intriguing and touching, Empire of Glass is a boldly imagined work that succeeds with its stylistic risks as a great novel and also a compelling read!" - Heidi W. Durrow, author of the New York Times bestseller The Girl Who Fell From The Sky
"Stunning and incisive, Empire of Glass will dazzle you with its meditations on history, poetry, love, and family." - Vanessa Hua, author Deceit and Other Possibilities, Finalist for the California Book Award

"I have the impression that Kaitlin Solimine must have written the novel calligraphically, caressing each letter and image." - Man Booker Finalist Josip Novakovich
"Pushing the boundaries of the novel form, this is a gorgeous experimental work." - BookRiot
"Between urban and rural settings, characters who quote Mao and those who inwardly resist him, literary passages that mirror or mask emotions, Empire of Glass is a provocative labyrinth." - Foreword Reviews (Five Stars)

About the Author

Kaitlin Solimine has been a U.S. Department of State Fulbright Creative Fellow in China and received several scholarships, awards, and residencies for her writing, including the 2012 Dzanc Books/Disquiet International Literary Program award judged by Colson Whitehead. Her fiction and non-fiction has been published in National Geographic, The Wall Street Journal, Guernica Magazine, Kartika Review, The Huffington Post, The World of Chinese Magazine, China Daily, and numerous anthologies. Kaitlin is co-founder of HIPPO Reads, a network connecting academic insights and scholars to the wider public. She resides in San Francisco with her husband and daughter where she was a 2016 SF Grotto Writing Fellow. Empire of Glass was named a finalist for the 2017 Center for Fiction's First Novel Prize.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Ig Publishing (June 20, 2017)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 304 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1632460556
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1632460554
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10.4 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 1 x 8.5 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #3,241,766 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #637 in Epistolary Fiction (Books)
- #8,082 in Alternate History Science Fiction (Books)
- #8,746 in Cultural Heritage Fiction

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4.8 59 ratings

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Empire of glass weaves together poetry and history, past ...

Reviewed in the United States on June 20, 2017

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Empire of glass weaves together poetry and history, past and present, to create a complex tapestry of story. The story plays out on multiple axes, including the history of China, the quotidian details of the characters lives both in retrospect and as they are telling the story (with contemporary detail provided mostly in the "translator's" footnotes). The innovative structure of the novel gives it a multi-layered quality that requires the reader to consider the role of the main character, Lao K, as both actor in the story and translator. It foregrounds questions of reliability and our recollections of history, personal and writ large, forcing the reader to think critically not just about the reliability of the story and its many narrators but also the process of constructing any story, "true" or "fictional."

4 people found this helpful

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Louise Nayer

Great work of fiction

Reviewed in the United States on July 20, 2017

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Empire of Glass is an extraordinary book. From the beginning to the end, the language drew me into the world of China, its history, its streets, its sounds and smells and its struggles. I was also drawn in to the inner life of mainly three characters, their lives intermeshed in miraculous and mysterious ways. Along with the amazing writing there is tension and suspense, so the book is also a page-turner. The writing is stunning—lives and breathes off the page. This is a great work of fiction, not to be missed.

One person found this helpful

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Isham Cook

Dense, fragmented narrative

Reviewed in the United States on September 16, 2020

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At a time when genre writers are rapidly clearing the field and no novelist who hopes to survive these days dare write a book without a murder or a torrid romance set in the historical past, I applaud the stubborn, heroic and foolhardy who act as if "literary" fiction were still alive when they alone know what the term even means anymore. Or call it "experimental" fiction, that which defies readers' expectations in having no clear beginning, middle and end, in other words a nonlinear narrative. I'm also on the lookout, as a China expat book watcher, for the rare novel which doesn't feature your pensive cheongsam-clad woman on the cover, with her fan or umbrella, too modest to be viewed except obliquely, from over her shoulder. Thus Kaitlin Solimine's oddly designed and titled Empire of Glass caught my attention when it first came out, though it took a while to work its way to the top of my reading list.

Solimine chronicles the history of a Beijing family over the latter half of last century up through the year the author herself lived with the family as a teenage exchange student. The cultural and linguistic hurdles of being thrust alone in a country as foreign as China would be daunting enough for anyone that young, but she bonded closely with her host family and was deeply and positively affected by the experience. The challenge for the author, in retrospect, was how to surmount the claustrophobic constraints of a straightforward first-person narrative by an impressionable sixteen-year old and achieve a more objective distancing, how to shift the focus from herself to her adopted family as they experienced their own reality. The result is a complex, layered narrative with multiple frames and fragmented perspectives, as if the story could only be viewed through intersecting prisms (suggestive of the book's title and cover of shattered glass), at the cost of a more unified vision.

One prism shows us Baba's (the father) mental upheaval as a teenage soldier when thrust into a sexual encounter with a captured American female army nurse just across the Chinese border in the Korean War. Half a century later, when the blond teenage Solimine ("Lao K" in her narrative incarnation) writes herself into the story, she ignites in the now elderly Baba memories of the blond nurse and fresh longings. He is on the verge of assaulting her when he pulls back after a single caress. I was relieved nothing worse happened, but the novelist in me craved a more explosive outcome, a more momentous, grievous event or a primal scene, out of which the narrative could erupt with a more inexorable purpose, than the actual denouement, Li-Ming's (the mama of the family) slow death from cancer, which dominates the final chapters.

What holds these dispersed threads together is a dense, finely woven poetic texture ("Time was words etched into caves. Books hidden under beds"; "I looked to my hands and saw only a broken sun, a damned, irreversible dawn"), which though occasionally overly bejeweled and abstruse, invites a second reading.

One person found this helpful

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PB

Intriguing insight, Poetically written

Reviewed in the United States on March 3, 2021

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Empire of Glass weaves you into a story that is as intriguing as China itself.
Beautifully written with rich detail and a true understanding of the land and its people, I highly recommend this superb book.

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ecreznic

I'd love for my students to spend time analyzing the metaphors ...

Reviewed in the United States on June 21, 2017

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Empire of Glass is a searing debut, one that cuts at the heart of the challenges of cross-cultural communication and asks important questions of cultural ownership, memory, and translation. As an English teacher, I'd love for my students to spend time analyzing the metaphors used as well as the structural elements of the overarching translator's note and footnotes. I loved the poetic quality of this work and will be excited to read more of Solimine's writing in the future!

3 people found this helpful

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YH

A fresh and emotional story about Chinese society and families

Reviewed in the United States on September 16, 2017

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In this prismatic story, I journeyed with a score of fascinating characters through the tumultuous historical events and personal battles. I savored Lao K’s footnotes, as she unearthed Baba’s and Li-Ming’s compelling stories in a visceral cultural context. Her depictions of Beijing and her Chinese family interweave astute observations, youthful passion, and deep humility. Solimine is a masterful storyteller. I eagerly await her next book.

Reviewed in the United States on July 11, 2017

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The author deep dives into a time and place in Chinese history and culture as few others and done before. Every sentence is deliberately crafted which almost feels like poetry at times. It's not a fast-paced page turner but those who enjoy savouring the stories that they've gotten lost in will find this to be a delightful read.

One person found this helpful

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Joseph

An Intricate, intriguing, and beautiful epic

Reviewed in the United States on June 22, 2017

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Wow - the intricately crafted prose, the carefully constructed complex story, and the overall beauty combined to make reading this a mesmerizing experience. The word choice and the imagery is fantastic and I couldn't put it down. Solimine is truly an artist and I look forward to reading more of her work.

One person found this helpful

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