The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng

Saturday, Mar. 16, 2024--San Antonio

The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng is historical fiction set in Penang, Malaysia in the early 1900s--just before and just after WWI.  Penang was a major crossroads city in Asia at the time and Malaysia was a British colony. The story brings together a number of interesting events that were happening in Penang at the time--a mystery murder by a prominent British female, a visit by the noted author Somerset Maugham visiting within the English community while looking for tales that he could turn into new stories for publication, and a visit by the Chinese revolutionist Sun Yat-Sen who is trying to raise money within the Chinese community for his next attempt to overthrow the Chinese government and establish a democracy there.  Woven into all of this are other aspects of life--stories of elaborate parties, stories of greed resulting in both success and failure, stories of hidden intrigue and history, and stories of affairs between persons from different cultures, affairs between people from the same cultures, and homosexual affairs by men who have married to try to cover their sexual orientation at a time just after the trial and imprisonment of Oscar Wilde.  Knowing Penang from having visited there twice, I was fascinated by the book which was long-listed for the Booker Prize last year and I didn't want the story to come to an end.  I gave it 5 stars out of 5.