EDINBURGH by Alexander Chee, read by Daniel K. Isaac, Josh Hurley
- Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc., January 29th 2019 (first published October 16th 2001)
- Genre: Historical Fiction, Literary Fiction
- Format: Audiobook
- Page Count: 8 hrs 11 mins (212 pages)
- My Rating: â â â â (4/5)
Click on the cover for my review on Goodreads.
Somewhere between a 4- and a 5-star.
The central theme of the book is pedophilia. It reminded me of the biographical movie Spotlight in the sense that both instances of church-related child molestation happened on the East Coast around the same time. Edinburgh was published the same year the original The Boston Globeâs âspotlightâ team started the investigation (2001), way before the team won a Pulitzer Prize for it (2003). I picked up this book because itâs queer and Asian, and I expected it to be sad and disturbing but I didnât know it would also be beautiful in both the writing and the perverseness of the characters.
Edinburgh consists of three parts: when Fee (biracial Korean American) was a boy, when Warden was fifteen, and when Fee was about thirty. Everything happened as the butterfly effect of the boys choir director Big Eric molesting at least twelve boys, Fee being one of them. Even after Big Ericâs arrest, the lives of everyone around Feeâhis crush Peter, his fuck buddy Zach, his friend Freddieâare the way they are because of their choir days. As Fee slowly reaches his adulthood, he still couldnât shake the feeling that everything was his fault. When he meets Warden after returning to his hometown, everything blows out of proportion fast.
The writing is both somber and lyrical; the lives of all the characters crash and burn and everything was written in such an evocative way. I love how Fee and Warden feel and see their surroundings, the ever-present heaviness and yearning in their thoughts. Part one of Edinburgh started when Fee was twelve, before he fell prey to Big Eric, and I did wonder if a twelve-year-old could think like that, like his world has turned sepia.
Chee is also a biracial Korean American gay man. I love how he introduced the Korean folklore of fox spirits into the story (vs Warden thinking himself as a bird) and also touched upon the cruelty the Japanese brought to Korea during WWIIâsame things happened to Taiwan (assimilation, âcomfort womenâ). It breaks me to learn about what Feeâs grandparents went through and now what Fee is going through. I wish Edinburgh didnât end as it did, but for Fee, how could it not?
I listened to the audiobook and it made the reading experience amazing. Daniel K. Isaac, who is also gay and Korean American, perfectly portrays Fee: the boy who was hurt, the man who never healed. I love Isaacâs voice, how he just sounded so sad and the rhythm he introduced to the sentences. Josh Hurley also narrated wonderfully as Warden, but we didnât get as much of him as Fee.
Edinburgh is not a romance and it is not supposed to be romantic. And yet it is deathly beautiful.
content warnings: pedophilia (child molestation, photographing nude children), drowning, sex between children, self harm (cutting, cigarette burns), f slur, pandemic (black death), suicide (self-immolation, gun), use of âhandicappedâ (school name back in 1980s), AIDS, loss of grandparents, arson, murder, racism, assimilation to Japanese culture, âcomfort womenâ
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