Product Description

“A rollicking, adventure-filled story . . . packed [with] the human capacity for love.”
–USA Today

“A superbly executed, good-hearted farce that is part romance and part mystery . . . With Tan’s many talents on display, it’s her idiosyncratic wit and sly observations . . . that make this book pure pleasure.”
–San Francisco Chronicle

San Francisco art patron Bibi Chen has planned a journey of the senses along the famed Burma Road for eleven lucky friends. But after her mysterious death, Bibi watches aghast from her ghostly perch as the travelers veer off her itinerary and embark on a trail paved with cultural gaffes and tribal curses, Buddhist illusions and romantic desires. On Christmas morning, the tourists cruise across a misty lake and disappear.

With picaresque characters and mesmerizing imagery, Saving Fish from Drowning gives us a voice as idiosyncratic, sharp, and affectionate as the mothers of The Joy Luck Club. Bibi is the observant eye of human nature–the witness of good intentions and bad outcomes, of desperate souls and those who wish to save them. In the end, Tan takes her readers to that place in their own heart where hope is found.


“Amy Tan is among our great storytellers.”
–The New York Times Book Review

“Amy Tan has created an almost magical adventure that, page by page, becomes a metaphor for human relationships.”
–Isabel Allende

“With humor, ruthlessness, and wild imagination, Tan has reaped [a] fantastic tale of human longings and (of course) their consequences.”
–Elle

“A book that’s easy to read and hard to forget.”
–Newsweek

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #20296 in Books
• Published on: 2006-09-26
• Released on: 2006-09-26
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 528 pages

Amazon.com Review
Amy Tan, who has an unerring eye for relationships between mothers and daughters, especially Chinese-American, has departed from her well-known genre in Saving Fish From Drowning. She would be well advised to revisit that theme which she writes about so well.

The title of the book is derived from the practice of Myanmar fishermen who "scoop up the fish and bring them to shore. They say they are saving the fish from drowning. Unfortunately... the fish do not recover," This kind of magical thinking or hypocrisy or mystical attitude or sheer stupidity is a fair metaphor for the entire book. It may be read as a satire, a political statement, a picaresque tale with several "picaros" or simply a story about a tour gone wrong.

Bibi Chen, San Francisco socialite and art vendor to the stars, plans to lead a trip for 12 friends: "My friends, those lovers of art, most of them rich, intelligent, and spoiled, would spend a week in China and arrive in Burma on Christmas Day." Unfortunately, Bibi dies, in very strange circumstances, before the tour begins. After wrangling about it, the group decides to go after all. The leader they choose is indecisive and epileptic, a dangerous combo. Bibi goes along as the disembodied voice-over.

Once in Myanmar, finally, they are noticed by a group of Karen tribesmen who decide that Rupert, the 15-year-old son of a bamboo grower is, in fact, Younger White Brother, or The Lord of the Nats. He can do card tricks and is carrying a Stephen King paperback. These are adjudged to be signs of his deity and ability to save them from marauding soldiers. The group is "kidnapped," although they think they are setting out for a Christmas Day surprise, and taken deep into the jungle where they languish, develop malaria, learn to eat slimy things and wait to be rescued. Nats are "believed to be the spirits of nature--the lake, the trees, the mountains, the snakes and birds. They were numberless ... They were everywhere, as were bad luck and the need to find reasons for it." Philosophy or cynicism? This elusive point of view is found throughout the novel--a bald statement is made and then Tan pulls her punches as if she is unwilling to make a statement that might set a more serious tone.

There are some goofy parts about Harry, the member of the group who is left behind, and his encounter with two newswomen from Global News Network, some slapstick sex scenes and a great deal of dog-loving dialogue. These all contribute to a novel that is silly but not really funny, could have an occasionally serious theme which suddenly disappears, and is about a group of stereotypical characters that it's hard to care about. It was time for Amy Tan to write another book; too bad this was it. --Valerie Ryan

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Tan (The Bonesetter's Daughter) delivers another highly entertaining novel, this one narrated from beyond the grave. San Francisco socialite and art-world doyenne Bibi Chen has planned the vacation of a lifetime along the notorious Burma Road for 12 of her dearest friends. Violently murdered days before takeoff, she's reduced to watching her friends bumble through their travels from the remove of the spirit world. Making the best of it, the 11 friends who aren't hung over depart their Myanmar resort on Christmas morning to boat across a misty lake—and vanish. The tourists find themselves trapped in jungle-covered mountains, held by a refugee tribe that believes Rupert, the group's surly teenager, is the reincarnation of their god Younger White Brother, come to save them from the unstable, militaristic Myanmar government. Tan's travelers, who range from a neurotic hypochondriac to the debonair, self-involved host of a show called The Fido Files, fight and flirt among themselves. While ensemble casting precludes the intimacy that characterizes Tan's mother-daughter stories, the book branches out with a broad plot and dynamic digressions. It's based on a true story, and Tan seems to be having fun with it, indulging in the wry, witty voice of Bibi while still exploring her signature questions of fate, connection, identity and family. (Oct.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From School Library Journal
Adult/High School–Fish is based on the real-life disappearance of 12 American tourists in Myanmar. The narrator is Bibi Chen, dealer in Chinese antiquities, who had arranged an art-oriented tour for her friends. When she dies under mysterious circumstances, the others decide to proceed, saying that Bibi will join them in spirit–an invitation she accepts. Mostly well-meaning, but ignorant and naive, the group lands in one hilarious situation after another due to cultural misunderstandings. On a lake outing, they are kidnapped and taken to a hidden village where a rebel tribe waits for the Younger White Brother, who will make them invisible and bullet-proof and enable them to recover their land. They believe that theyve found him in 15-year-old Rupert, an amateur magician. The tour group consists of 10 adults and 2 adolescents, some pillars of the community and some decidedly not, but all rich, intelligent, and spoiled. Bibi, feisty and opinionated, uncovers their fears, desires, and motives, and the shades of truth in their words. As the novel progresses, they become more human and less stereotypical, changing as a result of their experiences. Although Tan also satirizes the tourist industry, American Buddhism, and reality TV, her focus is on the American belief that everyone everywhere plays by the same rules. An extremely funny novel with serious undercurrents.–Sandy Freund, Richard Byrd Library, Fairfax County, VA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Customer Reviews

Glad I didn't read the negative reviews before I read the book
I found this book highly engaging and readable, the characters clearly defined. There was a great deal of humor, much of it black, and a great deal of heart. This book was a page turner with a message. Each character is a recognizable tourist type, and most of them would be horrified if they were saddled with the "Ugly American" label. But then, they really aren't "ugly" at all, but well meaning if clueless. On the other hand, the natives are not all innocents, and there is a lot of humor in the misdirections and misunderstandings that ensue. As I say in my title, I am glad I didn't read all these negative reviews first because I probably wouldn't have picked the book up at all and would have missed a nice reading experience.

Tan can do better
I adore Amy Tan's writing. I teach JLC to 10th graders every year, encourage them to go on and read The Kitchen God's Wife or The BoneSetter's Daughter. So when, on a trip to Singapore, I saw her latest novel, I pounced on it, dropped what I was currently reading and started in. Now, I'm the first to say Tan needed to move on; while her tales of family cultural conflict fascinate me, she's talented enough that I wanted to see her branch out. She has here, but not to good effect.

For a writer capable of such nuance and subtlety, I find SFFD oddly flat and predictable, naive even in its attempt to portray the cultural clash between her spoiled California tourists and their hapless kidnappers. Her characterizations are broad and obvious: the tourists think anything less than the Four Seasons is roughing it, travel with syringes and IV drips in case of disease, and effuse about wanting to experience the "real" people while sneering at the tourist route they are so blatantly part of. As a seasoned ex-pat myself, thse people are stereotypes among the travelling set, their broadly drawn characters failing to extend much beyond caricature. Yes, tourist can be patronizing and culturally insensitive and self-involved, all in the name of seeking an off-the-beaten-track experience, but Tan doesn't really tell us anything new, or even especially insightful here. Which is too bad, because her premise was wonderful.

Still, I give it a 3 because it is, after all, Amy Tan, and if we've grown to expect more from her, I'm not sure she should be penalized for writing that's only good, rather than her usual excellent. It is, in the end, a fun read. Just not as riveting as we're used to..

Step Aside, Mr. Wolfe
Fans of Amy Tan are in for a surprise with her latest novel, SAVING FISH FROM DROWNING. In this satirical tale of cross-cultural faux pas, international media, and uninformed American goodwill turned mostly bad, Ms. Tan writes an Asia-centered version of Tom Wolfe's BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES (or perhaps Richard Dooling's WHITE MAN'S GRAVE). Only here, she substitutes Burma (Myanmar) for the Bronx and GNN (read CNN) for the media precipitator of much of the climactic action. The end result, much like Wolfe's 1987 novel, is amusing for its social commentary but light in its literary heft, substituting caricature and fantastic naivete for character and improbable events for plot. Nevertheless, the result is quite entertaining, although hardly likely to spawn any anti-CNN, save the rain forests, or boycott Burma movements.

Ms. Tan chooses as her storytelling vehicle the ghost of a wealthy art patron, Bibi Chen, who has just met an untimely and rather ghastly violent death. Bibi had already organized an art and culture tour for a number of her longtime friends that had planned to follow the fabled Burma Road from Lijiang in southwestern China (claimed by some to be the inspiration for Shangri-La) across the closed border into Myanmar. Despite Bibi's death, her friends decide to follow her itinerary with a new (and unbeknown to them, gay, seizure-prone, and completely inexperienced) guide, Bennie Trueba y Cela. A series of misadventures and misunderstandings plague their trip, most of which the omniscient Bibi-ghost is powerless to prevent, but the group eventually crosses the border with Bibi's mysterious help. Once in Myanmar, more misunderstandings ensue and the twelve travelers finds themselves unknowingly involved in a sort of pseudo-Christian, second coming of Christ cult with members of a Burmese minority group called the Karen. All but one of the group disappear into the deep jungle on what they believe is a Christmas surprise part of their tour, but the rest of the world believes they have either been lost, killed, or kidnapped by anti-government insurgents.

SAVING FISH FROM DROWNING could well have been subtitled "Murphy's Law Comes to Myanmar," or perhaps "The Laws of Unintended Consequences." Innocent behavior turns to cultural insult, and everyone's best intentions create the worst of results. Ms. Tan draws of picture of hopeless cross-cultural confusion, where outdoor latrines turns out to be a sacred shrines, a copy of Stephen King's MISERY becomes the Holy Bible, and smuggled jewels and generous gifts of American dollars threaten or result in violent death at the hands of dictatorial governments. This indeed is the underlying premise of the Chinese fable about saving fish from drowning, that such acts of charity mask other objectives and often do little but harm to their intended recipients.

While Amy Tan's story line is serviceable in its role as socio-cultural satire, her characters are annoyingly stereotyped. The cast is filled with bumbling and culturally obtuse "ugly Americans," from the oversexed television star Harry Bailley to his sex-starved and swooning Chinese-American bombshell of a love object Marlena Chu, from the ultra-hypochondriac Heidi to the remarkably underdrawn Vera, a black woman who objects to the phrase "lazy eye" because "lazy" is a pejorative word. Most editorially unforgivable is the last chapter, a 42-page appendage that adds little and detracts much from the author's focus on events and misunderstandings in Myanmar, in the media, in intergovernmental relations, and among the group members themselves. Even the true nature of Bibi's death, once revealed, lends much weight to the outcome - just one more example of a fish saved from drowning only to die as an unintended result.

With SAVING FISH FROM DROWNING, Amy Tan has abandoned her usual cultural assimilation haunts for satirical realpolitik, tossing a Jon Stewart eye at American values and behavior and the dangers of unthinking, ratings-chasing media sensationalism. While this book is not on a literary par with Ms. Tan's THE BONESETTER'S DAUGHTER, it is nevertheless an engaging and often humorous read.