#Cherrytree consumer club movie
He likes to think of himself as a moral man but is troubled by how he set his scruples aside during this period of his life and wonders whether there may not be an element of karma in his subsequent loss.īy coincidence, I read My Enemy’s Cherry Tree on the same weekend that I watched Chang-dong Lee’s excellent movie Burning, which in turn is based on a Haruki Murakami short story, Barn Burning. The publishers describe it as Haruki Murakami meets Indecent Proposal, a strange description that perhaps does the novel no favoursīecoming convinced that the philanthropist in question, a wealthy businessman named Luo Yiming, is responsible for his wife’s disappearance, his mind spirals with conspiracy theories, pain and sporadic fury while, at the same time, he recalls the happy times he spent with Qiuzi when he was employed by a building firm, selling properties above their true value to unsuspecting low-income workers. Hoping that she’ll return one day, her husband sets up a coffee shop in her favourite place, living in a small loft above it, even though, as is repeatedly pointed out to him, it’s not a particularly good place to establish a business. They are initially happy but when she takes up photography as a hobby, she falls under the spell of a local philanthropist before disappearing without trace. The novel tells the story of a lonely and insecure man who, against all his expectations, falls in love with and marries a beautiful young woman, Qiuzi. My Enemy’s Cherry Tree has been quite the success in the author’s native Taiwan, winning many awards and selling like hot-cakes but, after a promising start, the overall sensation is of a curiously sterile book, heavily influenced by works from more established Chinese, Taiwanese and Japanese authors, and one that ultimately leaves the reader a little dissatisfied. How did he make his fortune? Has he been embittered over the last quarter century since his forced retreat from words? Did the old man die and, if so, how soon afterwards did Wang begin writing again? The whole thing is shrouded in mystery and not a little romantic charm. That alone makes this a novel of interest as it leaves so many questions unanswered. Having made his fortune, Wang returned with a vengeance after a 25-year absence.” While an author’s private life is usually off limits in a book review, Wang Ting-Kuo’s biography, supplied by the publisher, is one of the most intriguing I’ve come across: “He began writing fiction when he was 18 and quickly took the literary world by storm, only to disappear from the scene when his soon-to-be father-in-law gave him a devastating ultimatum: either give up the precarious life of a writer or give up my daughter.