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Ellie McEnroe #1
Rock Paper Tiger
American Ellie Cooper, deserted by her husband, has made a number of friends in China. But suddenly one of them disappears, and security organizations are hounding her for information. Contacted through an online role-playing game by a group claiming to be friends of Lao Zhang asking her for help, Ellie does the only thing she can - keep on playing.
Iraq vet Ellie Cooper is down and out in China, trying to lose herself in the alien worlds of performance artists and online gamers. When a chance encounter with a Muslim fugitive drops her down a rabbit hole of conspiracies, Ellie must decide who to trust among the artists, dealers, collectors and operatives claiming to be on her side – in particular, a mysterious organization operating within a popular online game.
Iraq vet Ellie Cooper is down and out in China, trying to lose herself in the alien worlds of performance artists and online gamers. When a chance encounter with a Muslim fugitive drops her down a rabbit hole of conspiracies, Ellie must decide who to trust among the artists, dealers, collectors and operatives claiming to be on her side – in particular, a mysterious organization operating within a popular online game.
368 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2010
55 people are currently reading
1190 people want to read
About the author
Lisa Brackmann
13 books146 followersLisa Brackmann is the New York Times best-selling author of the Ellie McEnroe novels set in China and the thrillers Getaway and Go-Between. The first Ellie book, Rock Paper Tiger (Year of the Tiger) was one of Amazon Top 100 Books of the Year and a Top 10 Mystery/Thriller. Hour Of The Rat, the sequel, was shortlisted for Left Coast Crime's international mystery award and was nominated for the Anthony Award for Best Audio Book. Dragon Day, the third novel in the Ellie McEnroe trilogy, was a Seattle Times Top 10 Mystery of 2015 and was short-listed for a Lefty award. Getaway (Day of the Dead) was an Amazon Best Book of the Month and a finalist for SCIBA's T. Jefferson Parker award. Her latest novel is Go-Between, "a terrific noir tale that channels Richard Stark's stories" and a "Hottest Summer Books" selection from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Black Swan Rising, her new book about misogyny, mass shootings, and polarized politics, launches Sept. 8. Her work has also appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Travel+Leisure, Salon and CNET. She lives in San Diego with a cat, far too many books and a bass ukulele and is playing in a band again after a 17-year break. You can find her online at www.lisabrackmann.com.
That's the official bio. You can find out more about me (if you are so inclined) on my website (www.lisabrackmann.com)
Thanks for visiting!
p.s. In the UK you'll find me as Lisa Brackman (one "n"). "Year of the Tiger" is the UK edition of "Rock Paper Tiger." "Day of the Dead" is the UK edition of "Getaway."
That's the official bio. You can find out more about me (if you are so inclined) on my website (www.lisabrackmann.com)
Thanks for visiting!
p.s. In the UK you'll find me as Lisa Brackman (one "n"). "Year of the Tiger" is the UK edition of "Rock Paper Tiger." "Day of the Dead" is the UK edition of "Getaway."
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 251 reviews
March 9, 2011
The story is compelling. I had to finish it. The main character/heroin has depth but the depth is murky and stale. She is a tortured soul who is stagnant, confused, unmotivated. The story, it drags you through to the end kicking and screaming. About halfway through the book, I was praying for it to end. It is well written but the heroine is just along for the ride. She should have just stayed home. Her lack luster approach to life is translated to her lack luster approach to solving her dilemma. She learns nothing. She does nothing. Everything is just happening to her. She figures nothing out, she goes places randomly, the story unfolds but you learn nothing throughout the unfolding. All the events that happen to the heroine appear to be so random with no purpose. I really think the author didn't even know what was going on. The author waits till the last chapter to tell you what happen in book and I think she made that up at the last second just to end the story. My suggestion; skip the torture and read the last chapter. It will save you some time and you will get just as much satisfaction.
February 23, 2012
Rock Paper Tiger, an up-to-the-minute, kaleidoscopic romp through contemporary China with some side-stops in US-occupied Iraq, is the first novel of Lisa Brackman, who I know as a fellow blogger who focuses on China. Lisa has done the impossible: created a taut, breathless thriller that along the way takes the reader on a whirlwind tour through China, the big cities, the smaller cities, the places tourists go and the country's underbelly. She manages to weave into the narrative an endless stream of details about life in China, what living there actually feels like, such vibrant images you can touch and taste them. In effect, it's a kind of primer on life in modern-day China, yet it never feels like we're being lectured or taught. Each image and each description is tightly connected to the story.
The hero Ellie Cooper, an Iraq war veteran now living in Beijing, doesn't know what she's getting into when she says "Nice to meet you" to a guest at her artist friend's apartment, Hashim, a Uighur. Hashim is in the book for all of 15 seconds, but it's this chance and rather meaningless encounter that soon has Ellie running as fast as she can, despite a leg wound she suffered in Iraq, as she's pursued by American mercenaries and undercover Chinese security police. And others. We never know who to trust or what's motivating them, and we never know where Ellie's roller-coaster chase will take us next.
Interspersed with (and related to) the chase are Ellie's flashbacks to several years back when she served in Iraq. One fateful day she stumbled into a secret prison that bears an uncanny resemblance to Abu Ghraib, but due to a mega-dose of fear and confusion she says nothing, despite her horror and her knowledge something really bad is going on. Does this make her a party to the crime? That's a question Ellie has to live with.
Another twist: a good portion of the story takes place online, within a video game Ellie must play in order to communicate with friends who - she hopes - can help her figure out what's going on. The descriptions of this virtual world and the challenges she meets there, like being attacked by a nine-headed bird are among the most imaginative in the book.
Every scene is jammed with imagery, but never to the point of being cluttered. If you've never been to China you may think Lisa is exaggerating. If anything, her descriptions are often understated, and hilarious. Here's Ellie, trying to hide from her pursuers after she arrives in Chengdu:
"I catch a cab outside the train station, take note of the giant statue of Mao with his arm outstretched like he's directing traffic - or maybe he's just trying to greet the patrons of the shopping malls and the Starbucks down the street.
"I get to the backpackers' joint, wedged between a hotpot restaurant and a camping-supply store on a narrow lane.
"'No baggage?' asks the...clerk? Manager? You can't call somebody a 'concierge' when he's sitting behind a scarred desk in a beige room containing a bulletin board leprous with notices about treks to Tibet and Jiuzhaigou and dubious job offers to teach English, a pressboard bookcase overflowing with paperbacks, and a pile of backpacks heaped in one corner."
Lisa similarly brings to life aspects of China that many of us take for granted: train travel (hard seats, soft sleepers and hard sleepers), Internet bars, dumpling houses, VPNs, Beijing art colonies, the lifestyle of the nouveau riche, the seedy karaoke bar of a backwater village, the sulfurous air of a coal mining city, the pollution (just about everywhere), the way Chinese people always ask your age and whether you're married.... For everything she observes (and that's a lot of things) she comes up with an image, often startling. How can she come up with so many images, and how can they all be this satisfying? Some new buildings in Beijing, for example, are "glassy high-rises with green Chinese-style roofs perched on top, like somebody put party hats on the heads of awkward giants."
What impressed me the most is that Lisa does the same with the flashbacks to Iraq - the imagery is just as detailed and precise. She's been to China many times, but never to Iraq. People who served in Iraq will have a hard time believing Lisa didn't.
Imagery and style and the thrill are one thing. But those are practically ancillary to what's at the heart of the story and that is Ellie Cooper's humanity and essential goodness. She's been to hell and back (in Iraq), only to be betrayed by her husband in China, and she's in constant pain - her popping percocets becomes a kind of punctuation of her various circumstances. You have no choice but to admire her.
The book leaves several loose ends loose. The fate of some key characters remains unresolved, and we're also left wondering whether certain characters are heroes or villains. But that's okay; the ambiguousness keeps you wondering when the book is over, and maybe that's partly why you can't get these people out of your head.
I always try to find something to criticize in a book I rave about in order to show "balance." But I can't criticize much here. Sometimes I wondered whether readers who know nothing about China might not find some of the images confusing, like a reference to someone wearing a "Cui Jian t-shirt," and they might get thrown when they see the word "fuwuyuan" (which soon gets defined by context). And maybe a part of me wanted all of the mysteries explained, but as with a Murakami novel, those loose ends make the book more intriguing.
But those aren't even criticisms. Rock Paper Tiger totally rocks in every way. It is so intense and trippy, so full of exotic images and astonishing characters who aren't what you first believe, I kept thinking, "This is perfect material for a movie." I hope some producer somewhere hears about this thriller on steroids and puts it on the screen where it ultimately belongs.
And this is Lisa Brackmann's first novel. I can't imagine anyone reading it and not thirsting for the next one.
The hero Ellie Cooper, an Iraq war veteran now living in Beijing, doesn't know what she's getting into when she says "Nice to meet you" to a guest at her artist friend's apartment, Hashim, a Uighur. Hashim is in the book for all of 15 seconds, but it's this chance and rather meaningless encounter that soon has Ellie running as fast as she can, despite a leg wound she suffered in Iraq, as she's pursued by American mercenaries and undercover Chinese security police. And others. We never know who to trust or what's motivating them, and we never know where Ellie's roller-coaster chase will take us next.
Interspersed with (and related to) the chase are Ellie's flashbacks to several years back when she served in Iraq. One fateful day she stumbled into a secret prison that bears an uncanny resemblance to Abu Ghraib, but due to a mega-dose of fear and confusion she says nothing, despite her horror and her knowledge something really bad is going on. Does this make her a party to the crime? That's a question Ellie has to live with.
Another twist: a good portion of the story takes place online, within a video game Ellie must play in order to communicate with friends who - she hopes - can help her figure out what's going on. The descriptions of this virtual world and the challenges she meets there, like being attacked by a nine-headed bird are among the most imaginative in the book.
Every scene is jammed with imagery, but never to the point of being cluttered. If you've never been to China you may think Lisa is exaggerating. If anything, her descriptions are often understated, and hilarious. Here's Ellie, trying to hide from her pursuers after she arrives in Chengdu:
"I catch a cab outside the train station, take note of the giant statue of Mao with his arm outstretched like he's directing traffic - or maybe he's just trying to greet the patrons of the shopping malls and the Starbucks down the street.
"I get to the backpackers' joint, wedged between a hotpot restaurant and a camping-supply store on a narrow lane.
"'No baggage?' asks the...clerk? Manager? You can't call somebody a 'concierge' when he's sitting behind a scarred desk in a beige room containing a bulletin board leprous with notices about treks to Tibet and Jiuzhaigou and dubious job offers to teach English, a pressboard bookcase overflowing with paperbacks, and a pile of backpacks heaped in one corner."
Lisa similarly brings to life aspects of China that many of us take for granted: train travel (hard seats, soft sleepers and hard sleepers), Internet bars, dumpling houses, VPNs, Beijing art colonies, the lifestyle of the nouveau riche, the seedy karaoke bar of a backwater village, the sulfurous air of a coal mining city, the pollution (just about everywhere), the way Chinese people always ask your age and whether you're married.... For everything she observes (and that's a lot of things) she comes up with an image, often startling. How can she come up with so many images, and how can they all be this satisfying? Some new buildings in Beijing, for example, are "glassy high-rises with green Chinese-style roofs perched on top, like somebody put party hats on the heads of awkward giants."
What impressed me the most is that Lisa does the same with the flashbacks to Iraq - the imagery is just as detailed and precise. She's been to China many times, but never to Iraq. People who served in Iraq will have a hard time believing Lisa didn't.
Imagery and style and the thrill are one thing. But those are practically ancillary to what's at the heart of the story and that is Ellie Cooper's humanity and essential goodness. She's been to hell and back (in Iraq), only to be betrayed by her husband in China, and she's in constant pain - her popping percocets becomes a kind of punctuation of her various circumstances. You have no choice but to admire her.
The book leaves several loose ends loose. The fate of some key characters remains unresolved, and we're also left wondering whether certain characters are heroes or villains. But that's okay; the ambiguousness keeps you wondering when the book is over, and maybe that's partly why you can't get these people out of your head.
I always try to find something to criticize in a book I rave about in order to show "balance." But I can't criticize much here. Sometimes I wondered whether readers who know nothing about China might not find some of the images confusing, like a reference to someone wearing a "Cui Jian t-shirt," and they might get thrown when they see the word "fuwuyuan" (which soon gets defined by context). And maybe a part of me wanted all of the mysteries explained, but as with a Murakami novel, those loose ends make the book more intriguing.
But those aren't even criticisms. Rock Paper Tiger totally rocks in every way. It is so intense and trippy, so full of exotic images and astonishing characters who aren't what you first believe, I kept thinking, "This is perfect material for a movie." I hope some producer somewhere hears about this thriller on steroids and puts it on the screen where it ultimately belongs.
And this is Lisa Brackmann's first novel. I can't imagine anyone reading it and not thirsting for the next one.
December 27, 2011
I had no idea what to expect from this book; I was just intrigued by the title and the cover and the synopsis. I was very pleasantly surprised to get a fast-moving, well-written tale with an ex-pat's view of contemporary China.
The first-person narrator, Ellie Cooper, is a young former US Army medic hanging out in China on a semi-expired visa, still shell-shocked by the destruction of her marriage and her ongoing issues with PTSD relating to some really bad things that happened in Iraq. She married a fellow soldier she met in Iraq, who brought her to China when he left the service and became a "contractor" for a private security firm, and like most such ill-thought military marriages, things quickly fell apart. Her estranged husband is now living a "God-centered life" with the Chinese girl he hooked up with, and between badgering Ellie to sign the divorce papers, urges her to "accept Jesus into her heart," which is a nice bit of bitter humor that runs throughout the book, as Ellie also keeps receiving Jesus-y emails from her mother back home.
While Ellie is trying to pick herself up and put herself back together, she has been hanging out with an eclectic bunch of Chinese artists and MMORPG addicts. One day she visits her artist friend Lao Zhang, and finds a Uighur -- a Muslim minority ethnic group in China -- visiting. Lao Zhang disappears, the Uighur disappears, and the rest of the book becomes paranoia fuel for poor Ellie, as she has absolutely no idea what any of these people were up to, if anything, but both Chinese and American agents are after them and thinks she does know something. All of her friends become suspect, she is sent on a bizarre quest given to her inside her friend's online game which she thinks is meant to help him in the real world, and meanwhile her not-quite-ex-husband is involved in the whole thing as well. Right up until the end, you are no more sure than Ellie is who the bad guys and who the good guys are or WTF is going on.
The story itself is fast-paced and interesting, but nothing hugely revelatory happens at the end. The appeal of this book is the view of China, the accuracy of which I cannot attest to, but it reads like a thoroughly modern and believable tour through the kinda-communist semi-capitalist military-corporate-industrial complex that is today's PRC, a place that is trying to put a happy shine on what's still very much a corrupt police state, but one where you can find KFC, McDonald's, or Starbucks (or a Chinese knockoff thereof) on any street corner in Beijing. Ellie is only semi-acclimated, so she's still an alien in a place she knows she doesn't belong.
Ellie's voice is what made me enjoy this book so much. She's probably one of the most compelling and believable characters I've read in a contemporary novel in quite a while. She's not tough or bad-ass- she's in over her head, she just wants a little peace and safety, but she keeps getting walloped, emotionally and physically, and she has no choice but to "suck it up and drive on," as we used to say in the Army. She joined the Army as a kid looking to make some money for college and found herself dropped into the deep end, and now she's fallen into another pit in China. She's wracked with guilt, anger, and physical and mental disabilities, but as her life keeps taking left turns, she tries to do the right thing even while scorning her own ability to figure out what that is.
All in all, a thoroughly enjoyable novel. A combination of a mystery, war story, and ex-pat adventure/thriller, this doesn't make any lists of great literature or super-memorable reads for me, but I still recommend it without reservation, and if the author turned it into a series with Ellie as a recurring character, I would certainly be on board.
The first-person narrator, Ellie Cooper, is a young former US Army medic hanging out in China on a semi-expired visa, still shell-shocked by the destruction of her marriage and her ongoing issues with PTSD relating to some really bad things that happened in Iraq. She married a fellow soldier she met in Iraq, who brought her to China when he left the service and became a "contractor" for a private security firm, and like most such ill-thought military marriages, things quickly fell apart. Her estranged husband is now living a "God-centered life" with the Chinese girl he hooked up with, and between badgering Ellie to sign the divorce papers, urges her to "accept Jesus into her heart," which is a nice bit of bitter humor that runs throughout the book, as Ellie also keeps receiving Jesus-y emails from her mother back home.
While Ellie is trying to pick herself up and put herself back together, she has been hanging out with an eclectic bunch of Chinese artists and MMORPG addicts. One day she visits her artist friend Lao Zhang, and finds a Uighur -- a Muslim minority ethnic group in China -- visiting. Lao Zhang disappears, the Uighur disappears, and the rest of the book becomes paranoia fuel for poor Ellie, as she has absolutely no idea what any of these people were up to, if anything, but both Chinese and American agents are after them and thinks she does know something. All of her friends become suspect, she is sent on a bizarre quest given to her inside her friend's online game which she thinks is meant to help him in the real world, and meanwhile her not-quite-ex-husband is involved in the whole thing as well. Right up until the end, you are no more sure than Ellie is who the bad guys and who the good guys are or WTF is going on.
The story itself is fast-paced and interesting, but nothing hugely revelatory happens at the end. The appeal of this book is the view of China, the accuracy of which I cannot attest to, but it reads like a thoroughly modern and believable tour through the kinda-communist semi-capitalist military-corporate-industrial complex that is today's PRC, a place that is trying to put a happy shine on what's still very much a corrupt police state, but one where you can find KFC, McDonald's, or Starbucks (or a Chinese knockoff thereof) on any street corner in Beijing. Ellie is only semi-acclimated, so she's still an alien in a place she knows she doesn't belong.
Ellie's voice is what made me enjoy this book so much. She's probably one of the most compelling and believable characters I've read in a contemporary novel in quite a while. She's not tough or bad-ass- she's in over her head, she just wants a little peace and safety, but she keeps getting walloped, emotionally and physically, and she has no choice but to "suck it up and drive on," as we used to say in the Army. She joined the Army as a kid looking to make some money for college and found herself dropped into the deep end, and now she's fallen into another pit in China. She's wracked with guilt, anger, and physical and mental disabilities, but as her life keeps taking left turns, she tries to do the right thing even while scorning her own ability to figure out what that is.
All in all, a thoroughly enjoyable novel. A combination of a mystery, war story, and ex-pat adventure/thriller, this doesn't make any lists of great literature or super-memorable reads for me, but I still recommend it without reservation, and if the author turned it into a series with Ellie as a recurring character, I would certainly be on board.
September 10, 2012
Ahhh, the annoying protagonist...my favorite. Suddenly finding herself connected to (internationally) suspected terrorists, chased by both Chinese Secret Police and a menacing global security company (think Blackwater), the protagonist gets drunk at every occasion (why have a beer when you can have ten), adopts a core strategy of "what the f*%k...I'll figure it out tomorrow", mopes in a constant funk about her terrible ex-husband, and acts like a sulky teenager in the midst of wealthy Chinese intellectuals and dissident artists. Everyone in the book -- her mysterious dissident friend, wealthy benefactors and the people chasing her -- act like she's worth protecting, involving or chasing, but I have no idea why.
The author does a decent job of keeping up the "thriller pressure" and that kept me reading to get answers; "What's the secret? Why are they chasing her? What's worth all this danger & fuss?" Sadly, after wasting excessive time on extraneous details and scene descriptions (it's like a travel book with a thriller veneer), when you finally get to the end the climax is a cheap save (not as bad as "Turns out I was dreaming!", but almost) with a flat epilogue that dryly explains things. Ugh.
Given the author's apparent knowledge of post-millennial warfare (military vs private contractors, etc) and post-Globalization Chinese society, it could have been a fascinating story. Instead, I ended up hoping they'd actually catch the protagonist and lock her away in a very quiet room somewhere.
The author does a decent job of keeping up the "thriller pressure" and that kept me reading to get answers; "What's the secret? Why are they chasing her? What's worth all this danger & fuss?" Sadly, after wasting excessive time on extraneous details and scene descriptions (it's like a travel book with a thriller veneer), when you finally get to the end the climax is a cheap save (not as bad as "Turns out I was dreaming!", but almost) with a flat epilogue that dryly explains things. Ugh.
Given the author's apparent knowledge of post-millennial warfare (military vs private contractors, etc) and post-Globalization Chinese society, it could have been a fascinating story. Instead, I ended up hoping they'd actually catch the protagonist and lock her away in a very quiet room somewhere.
January 8, 2017
A lot of thrillers use exotic locales for their setting. The best of these manage to make the setting part of the story; many simply use it as backdrop. A few wouldn't work at all if the action moved to another place. Rock Paper Tiger is one of these.
Look up "hot mess" on Wikipedia and you'll get a picture of Ellie McEnroe, our protagonist (it's hard to think of her as a heroine). Adrift in the wilds of Beijing, functionally unemployed, with a tour as an Army medic in Iraq in her past but not yet behind her (her souvenirs: a disfigured leg, a nagging case of PTSD, and a Percocet addiction), Ellie gets by through massive doses of alcohol, a bad attitude, flawed decision-making skills, a not especially rigorous taste in bedmates, and an ability to stay off the radar screens of the various Chinese security organs. When her artist friend-with-benefits Lao Zhang takes in a stray Uighur and subsequently disappears, Ellie finds herself in the crosshairs of Chinese and American men-in-black and various movers in the upper castes of Chinese society.
Elle is one of those characters who's more interesting on the page than she would be in real life. The plot requires you to hold onto Ellie's belt loops and go along on her ride. Luckily, she brings a sort of feral intelligence to her cross-China chase and has just enough heart that you'll be able to root for her to get out of this chapter's jam. She seems very real in her observations and her thought processes. In real life, someone like Ellie would be exhausting, exasperating, and probably toxic to be around. She's okay company while confined in a story, though; she's not likely to hit you up for a loan, drink all your booze or ask to crash on your sofa.
The author lived in China for some while, and it shows. The crazy kaleidoscope of China, both in the center and on the periphery, is not merely the stage set for this story but the entire motivating force; it would be impossible to move the action to Chicago or Helsinki and still have a prayer of making it work. The author (through Ellie's first-person narrative) shows us the penthouse apartments and dumpling dives, the warehouse clubs and crappy apartments, the shopping malls, high-rises and outhouses that make up China's urban landscape.
But more than that, the contradictions, absurdities and pathologies of a system being dragged through monumental, rapid change set the parameters of Ellie's adventures and define the obstacles -- both geographic and organizational -- that she has to overcome. An online multiplayer role-playing game serves as a clandestine meeting place for Ellie and some of her co-conspirators, but China itself is portrayed as a surreal, multi-level, immersive computer game. It all seems very authentic (I recognized some parts from a trip I took through China several years ago) and it's undeniably atmospheric.
The plot is convoluted rather than merely complex; you won't always be able to figure out what's going on while it's happening. Neither can Ellie, for that matter. Ellie certainly isn't passive, but she also doesn't drive events -- most of the time they drive her, sometimes literally. If you want your hero or heroine to have agency and take control of his/her destiny, you may be disappointed here. If you have a need for a tidy story or for loose ends to be tied off and snipped, this is not a book for you.
Rock Paper Tiger is a fast-paced thriller with a bowl-of-noodles plot and a massively flawed protagonist. Through it, you'll get a rat's-eye view of the chaos caused by wreaking drastic, jet-speed change on an ancient society that's been through more seismic shocks in half a century than most nations see in a millennium. Like that chaos, the story isn't pretty and doesn't always make sense. But if you're looking for something different, this could be your bowl of jiaozi.
Look up "hot mess" on Wikipedia and you'll get a picture of Ellie McEnroe, our protagonist (it's hard to think of her as a heroine). Adrift in the wilds of Beijing, functionally unemployed, with a tour as an Army medic in Iraq in her past but not yet behind her (her souvenirs: a disfigured leg, a nagging case of PTSD, and a Percocet addiction), Ellie gets by through massive doses of alcohol, a bad attitude, flawed decision-making skills, a not especially rigorous taste in bedmates, and an ability to stay off the radar screens of the various Chinese security organs. When her artist friend-with-benefits Lao Zhang takes in a stray Uighur and subsequently disappears, Ellie finds herself in the crosshairs of Chinese and American men-in-black and various movers in the upper castes of Chinese society.
Elle is one of those characters who's more interesting on the page than she would be in real life. The plot requires you to hold onto Ellie's belt loops and go along on her ride. Luckily, she brings a sort of feral intelligence to her cross-China chase and has just enough heart that you'll be able to root for her to get out of this chapter's jam. She seems very real in her observations and her thought processes. In real life, someone like Ellie would be exhausting, exasperating, and probably toxic to be around. She's okay company while confined in a story, though; she's not likely to hit you up for a loan, drink all your booze or ask to crash on your sofa.
The author lived in China for some while, and it shows. The crazy kaleidoscope of China, both in the center and on the periphery, is not merely the stage set for this story but the entire motivating force; it would be impossible to move the action to Chicago or Helsinki and still have a prayer of making it work. The author (through Ellie's first-person narrative) shows us the penthouse apartments and dumpling dives, the warehouse clubs and crappy apartments, the shopping malls, high-rises and outhouses that make up China's urban landscape.
But more than that, the contradictions, absurdities and pathologies of a system being dragged through monumental, rapid change set the parameters of Ellie's adventures and define the obstacles -- both geographic and organizational -- that she has to overcome. An online multiplayer role-playing game serves as a clandestine meeting place for Ellie and some of her co-conspirators, but China itself is portrayed as a surreal, multi-level, immersive computer game. It all seems very authentic (I recognized some parts from a trip I took through China several years ago) and it's undeniably atmospheric.
The plot is convoluted rather than merely complex; you won't always be able to figure out what's going on while it's happening. Neither can Ellie, for that matter. Ellie certainly isn't passive, but she also doesn't drive events -- most of the time they drive her, sometimes literally. If you want your hero or heroine to have agency and take control of his/her destiny, you may be disappointed here. If you have a need for a tidy story or for loose ends to be tied off and snipped, this is not a book for you.
Rock Paper Tiger is a fast-paced thriller with a bowl-of-noodles plot and a massively flawed protagonist. Through it, you'll get a rat's-eye view of the chaos caused by wreaking drastic, jet-speed change on an ancient society that's been through more seismic shocks in half a century than most nations see in a millennium. Like that chaos, the story isn't pretty and doesn't always make sense. But if you're looking for something different, this could be your bowl of jiaozi.
November 19, 2015
Terrific book...the first I've read in a long time that kept me up late turning pages.
Brackmann has a lot to say about the perfidy of those in power everywhere who join forces and will stop at nothing to maintain power, about the nasty little deals that governments/corporations/the very rich make with each other, and how their deals affect the rest of us ordinary folk in all the countries of world. If that all sounds a bit too political, then let me put it another way. Brackmann has done a masterful job of creating a very real, complex and wounded character, Ellie, who is trying to cope with physical wounds and PTSD caused by her tour of duty in Iraq as a 19 year-old (what she saw there...and what she can't forget is a big part of this). She follows her husband to China for his new job, their marriage quickly fails, and she finds herself drawn to a Chinese artist devoted to building community. Ellie is quickly caught up in an intrigue, the nature of which is way over her head, after she very briefly meets a Uighur dissident at the Chinese artist's home. Life gets scary after that. She finds herself being chased by "Suits" - from the Chinese PSB? the U.S. government?, American private security firms? or all of the above? ....but clearly all these Suits have violence on their minds. Ellie's personal integrity stays intact even though she often has no idea of who and what she's dealing with or why they are all after her. In the process she begins to come to terms with her past, and she starts to create a new life for herself. I've been to China many times, and can say for sure that Brackman nails China...not the tourists' China, but the "new China." I also think that this is a fictional way to deal with the dark side of the American "war on terrorism." And I'm not talking about the terrorists.
Brackmann has a lot to say about the perfidy of those in power everywhere who join forces and will stop at nothing to maintain power, about the nasty little deals that governments/corporations/the very rich make with each other, and how their deals affect the rest of us ordinary folk in all the countries of world. If that all sounds a bit too political, then let me put it another way. Brackmann has done a masterful job of creating a very real, complex and wounded character, Ellie, who is trying to cope with physical wounds and PTSD caused by her tour of duty in Iraq as a 19 year-old (what she saw there...and what she can't forget is a big part of this). She follows her husband to China for his new job, their marriage quickly fails, and she finds herself drawn to a Chinese artist devoted to building community. Ellie is quickly caught up in an intrigue, the nature of which is way over her head, after she very briefly meets a Uighur dissident at the Chinese artist's home. Life gets scary after that. She finds herself being chased by "Suits" - from the Chinese PSB? the U.S. government?, American private security firms? or all of the above? ....but clearly all these Suits have violence on their minds. Ellie's personal integrity stays intact even though she often has no idea of who and what she's dealing with or why they are all after her. In the process she begins to come to terms with her past, and she starts to create a new life for herself. I've been to China many times, and can say for sure that Brackman nails China...not the tourists' China, but the "new China." I also think that this is a fictional way to deal with the dark side of the American "war on terrorism." And I'm not talking about the terrorists.
January 28, 2012
Ellie Cooper is a veteran of the Iraq war who got more than she bargained for when she enlisted. Wounded both physically and emotionally, she finds herself in China, living from day-to-day on the fringes of an artistic community. Her best friend is an artist named Lao Zghang. Ellie, who is separated from her husband, sometimes sleeps with Lao, but they are not really lovers.
One day, Ellie goes to Lao's home, looking to hang out and perhaps watch him work. There she meets a mysterious Uighur who is staying briefly with Lao. Shortly thereafter, Lao mysteriously disappears and Ellie finds herself caught squarely in the sights of a number of very bad characters. Some of the men pursuing Ellie may be American agents of one sort or another; others are perhaps agents of the Chinese government; all of them are determined to get what they want from Ellie regardless of the cost to her and irrespective of any "rights" she thinks she might enjoy either as an American citizen or as a human being.
This is a chilling post-9/11 tale, set in China rather than the U.S., that raises serious questions about the liberties that Americans and others may willingly or unwillingly surrender in the name of fighting terrorism.
One day, Ellie goes to Lao's home, looking to hang out and perhaps watch him work. There she meets a mysterious Uighur who is staying briefly with Lao. Shortly thereafter, Lao mysteriously disappears and Ellie finds herself caught squarely in the sights of a number of very bad characters. Some of the men pursuing Ellie may be American agents of one sort or another; others are perhaps agents of the Chinese government; all of them are determined to get what they want from Ellie regardless of the cost to her and irrespective of any "rights" she thinks she might enjoy either as an American citizen or as a human being.
This is a chilling post-9/11 tale, set in China rather than the U.S., that raises serious questions about the liberties that Americans and others may willingly or unwillingly surrender in the name of fighting terrorism.
May 8, 2011
An absolutely terrific first thriller about a female U.S. Army medic, damaged physically and emotionally in the Middle East, who finds herself in Beijing with her husband, whom she met in Iraq and who's on assignment. While still addicted to the Percocet she takes to dull the pain in her patched-together legs, she's putting her world together emotionally when her husband cheats on her. At the beginning of the book she's dodging his attempts to finalize the divorce and hanging out with a colony of artists in a sort of artist's colony in an old industrial site in Beijing -- even having a low-key relationship with a Chinese painter. And then one night she meets a Uighur in the painter's flat, and the next thing she knows, the whole world is after her -- American contractors, Chinese security forces, even apparent friends. From her time in Iraq, she knows exactly the kind of treatment she'll receive if the wrong people catch her -- but who are the right people, and why is everyone after her?
Brackmann integrates chapters of backstory from the Middle East without ever once damaging the momentum, and the first-person narrative (present tense in the Chinese segments, past tense in Iraq) put the character right in the middle of the reader's head. There's an intriguing twist when aspects of the story go virtual -- she discovers that there's a conspiracy group that may be her best allies hiding in plain sight in an elaborate multi-player online game.
A little muddled at the end, but pretty damned dazzling.
Brackmann integrates chapters of backstory from the Middle East without ever once damaging the momentum, and the first-person narrative (present tense in the Chinese segments, past tense in Iraq) put the character right in the middle of the reader's head. There's an intriguing twist when aspects of the story go virtual -- she discovers that there's a conspiracy group that may be her best allies hiding in plain sight in an elaborate multi-player online game.
A little muddled at the end, but pretty damned dazzling.
August 25, 2020
Rock Paper Tiger by Lisa Brackmann is the first of 3 books featuring Ellie Cooper, a young American, an Iraqi War vet and now a woman struggling with post traumatic stress issues and pain from a war bombing, now living in China. I have to say this story grabbed me right from the get-go, drew me in and held my interest until the very end. Excellent first book.
The story starts in China. Ellie lives there, now separated from her cheating husband, Trey, struggling with her issues and surviving on her medical benefits and working part time at a bar. She is in a semi-relationship with a Chinese artist Lao Zhang, spending time with him and also sharing a flat with another Chinese computer geek, Chuckie. The story moves from events in China to her time in Iraq as an Army medic and the development of a relationship with Trey (Military Intelligence) and traumatic events she sees and in some ways participates in.
Back in China, Ellie finds herself involved in 'something'. It all revolves around an Uighur man who is staying with Lao Zhang. American security personnel are interested and also Chinese security officials follow and interrogate Ellie. The whole story is fascinating and action packed, some quite disturbing. Ellie is something of an anti-hero; suffering constant pain, finding it difficult to trust anyone and having her own dark secrets. The story moves around China as Ellie both tries to evade her 'enemies' and tries to communicate with Lao Zhang. Very interesting concept as they move also through an internet game world, using avatars to communicate.
Ellie is definitely an interesting, multi-dimensional character, a person unsure of what she must do and often just reacting to situations. Her friends are all interesting and the story and situations all just grab your attention. I don't want to ruin the story but suffice it to say that you will find it difficult to put down and will find some satisfaction with an excellent ending. (5 stars)
The story starts in China. Ellie lives there, now separated from her cheating husband, Trey, struggling with her issues and surviving on her medical benefits and working part time at a bar. She is in a semi-relationship with a Chinese artist Lao Zhang, spending time with him and also sharing a flat with another Chinese computer geek, Chuckie. The story moves from events in China to her time in Iraq as an Army medic and the development of a relationship with Trey (Military Intelligence) and traumatic events she sees and in some ways participates in.
Back in China, Ellie finds herself involved in 'something'. It all revolves around an Uighur man who is staying with Lao Zhang. American security personnel are interested and also Chinese security officials follow and interrogate Ellie. The whole story is fascinating and action packed, some quite disturbing. Ellie is something of an anti-hero; suffering constant pain, finding it difficult to trust anyone and having her own dark secrets. The story moves around China as Ellie both tries to evade her 'enemies' and tries to communicate with Lao Zhang. Very interesting concept as they move also through an internet game world, using avatars to communicate.
Ellie is definitely an interesting, multi-dimensional character, a person unsure of what she must do and often just reacting to situations. Her friends are all interesting and the story and situations all just grab your attention. I don't want to ruin the story but suffice it to say that you will find it difficult to put down and will find some satisfaction with an excellent ending. (5 stars)
June 13, 2010
Character, character, character!
Many of the reviews I've read have focused on the fast pace and fascinating tour of modern-day China Lisa Brackmann renders in Rock Paper Tiger but, for me, what made this debut novel so engrossing was its main character, Ellie McEnroe Cooper. Ellie is an Iraq war veteran physically and mentally wounded by her experiences in Iraq, which Brackmann blends wonderfully in flashbacks throughout the novel. Ellie and fellow comrade Trey Cooper's shared experience in Iraq unites them, but once married and living a civilian life again, they find the one thread binding them is fraught with shame because of their silence at witnessing their fellow soldiers frequent unethical behavior. When Trey's job leads him to China, Ellie follows in a half-hearted attempt to save her fast-crumbling marriage. Besides, what else is there to do. And that, in a nutshell, is Ellie at the start of the novel--a woman without direction whose head's not really in the game.
Whether Ellie likes it or not, though, after Trey's unfaithfulness ends their marriage and her sometimes-lover mysteriously flees the artist colony in which he lives, Ellie becomes a player in a dangerous game between artists, thugs, and government officials. As Ellie battles through her percocet-induced haze to understand why she's been targeted and determine who's friend and who's foe, the foreign setting really enhances the sense of isolation (and thus reader sympathy). Her muted reality becomes all too acute as she's stalked throughout China understanding little, but strengthening her will to survive.
Not only did I root for Ellie, I wanted to walk alongside her, help her figure things out, and share in a laugh that encountering such absurdities can only be responded to with humor. I could have easily hung out with Ellie longer, and while reading it even awoke one morning thinking about her.
I don't want to give away the ending, but unlike some of the other reviewers who thought it fell a bit flat, I disagree. I thought it perfect that after being lost for so long because of her past, she find purpose again in the present. While Ellie's been chased throughout China, what she ran into is her true self.
Many of the reviews I've read have focused on the fast pace and fascinating tour of modern-day China Lisa Brackmann renders in Rock Paper Tiger but, for me, what made this debut novel so engrossing was its main character, Ellie McEnroe Cooper. Ellie is an Iraq war veteran physically and mentally wounded by her experiences in Iraq, which Brackmann blends wonderfully in flashbacks throughout the novel. Ellie and fellow comrade Trey Cooper's shared experience in Iraq unites them, but once married and living a civilian life again, they find the one thread binding them is fraught with shame because of their silence at witnessing their fellow soldiers frequent unethical behavior. When Trey's job leads him to China, Ellie follows in a half-hearted attempt to save her fast-crumbling marriage. Besides, what else is there to do. And that, in a nutshell, is Ellie at the start of the novel--a woman without direction whose head's not really in the game.
Whether Ellie likes it or not, though, after Trey's unfaithfulness ends their marriage and her sometimes-lover mysteriously flees the artist colony in which he lives, Ellie becomes a player in a dangerous game between artists, thugs, and government officials. As Ellie battles through her percocet-induced haze to understand why she's been targeted and determine who's friend and who's foe, the foreign setting really enhances the sense of isolation (and thus reader sympathy). Her muted reality becomes all too acute as she's stalked throughout China understanding little, but strengthening her will to survive.
Not only did I root for Ellie, I wanted to walk alongside her, help her figure things out, and share in a laugh that encountering such absurdities can only be responded to with humor. I could have easily hung out with Ellie longer, and while reading it even awoke one morning thinking about her.
I don't want to give away the ending, but unlike some of the other reviewers who thought it fell a bit flat, I disagree. I thought it perfect that after being lost for so long because of her past, she find purpose again in the present. While Ellie's been chased throughout China, what she ran into is her true self.
December 25, 2010
This was an excellent political thriller, with many more layers of meaning than I've usually found in this genre. The descriptions of China were vivid and evocative and took me back to my own experience of that fascinating country. The descriptions of a young female veteran's experience of the Iraq war were thought-provoking. The protagonist was unlike any I've yet seen, a breath of fresh air - or perhaps I should say polluted air, which is what made her interesting.
Ellie McEnroe wasn't especially educated or sexy, morally superior or traditionally heroic. Yet, I came to feel a real empathy for this f-bomb dropping, responsibility evading, former-Jesus freaking, psychologically damaged soul. The story follows a riveting chase through several landscapes: China, a virtual reality game, and the troubled mind of an Iraq war veteran who has seen too much - and not just in Iraq. Ellie discovers that in a country lacking apparent freedom, even people who aren't political can be targeted as a political threat. She also discovers that in a country boasting apparent freedom, human rights can still be sold if the price is right.
I can't wait to read Lisa Brackmann's next book.
Ellie McEnroe wasn't especially educated or sexy, morally superior or traditionally heroic. Yet, I came to feel a real empathy for this f-bomb dropping, responsibility evading, former-Jesus freaking, psychologically damaged soul. The story follows a riveting chase through several landscapes: China, a virtual reality game, and the troubled mind of an Iraq war veteran who has seen too much - and not just in Iraq. Ellie discovers that in a country lacking apparent freedom, even people who aren't political can be targeted as a political threat. She also discovers that in a country boasting apparent freedom, human rights can still be sold if the price is right.
I can't wait to read Lisa Brackmann's next book.
November 10, 2010
The settings are good: the streets of Beijing, low-life apartments and artiste squatter warehouses, the hard-sleeper trains, the Net cafes filled with smoke and noise and young men living on-line. The sandbox of Iraq and Saddam's old compounds. The Misty Mountain Tea Garden and the Arbors of Serenity virtual environments.
The characters diverse: slouching skate-punk artists, sophisticate art dealers, US Army security contractors, medics, Congressional aides, Chinese students, street savants, computer nerd hacker programmer gamers.
The narrator is a hard-boiled, PTSD, percoset-assisted lady Iraq War veteran adrift in China and mixed up in some very serious shit. But the reasons and logic of the shit remain undisclosed. All the dark alley intrigues, all the thug brutality, all the online personas and avatars and secret identities, all the cloak and dagger, it just comes and goes without linking to Ellie or her friend, the artist, Lao Zhang. Beijing is chaos, and totalitarianism can squash anybody at random. Maybe that's the point of a plot that is impossible to sort out.
The characters diverse: slouching skate-punk artists, sophisticate art dealers, US Army security contractors, medics, Congressional aides, Chinese students, street savants, computer nerd hacker programmer gamers.
The narrator is a hard-boiled, PTSD, percoset-assisted lady Iraq War veteran adrift in China and mixed up in some very serious shit. But the reasons and logic of the shit remain undisclosed. All the dark alley intrigues, all the thug brutality, all the online personas and avatars and secret identities, all the cloak and dagger, it just comes and goes without linking to Ellie or her friend, the artist, Lao Zhang. Beijing is chaos, and totalitarianism can squash anybody at random. Maybe that's the point of a plot that is impossible to sort out.
July 8, 2013
If I could sum up this book's plot in one sentence... that would be great.
"Describe what your book is about in one sentence" is one of those daft creative writing exercises teachers love to assign. They can be pretty tedious, but the one-sentence-summary CAN serve as a useful reality check to make sure that the book you are writing is about something. It certainly would have served author Lisa Brackmann well in her first outing.
Brackmann's writing shows promise: her depictions of modern China in all its self-contradictory glory ring vivid and true. Her central character, Iraq war veteran and divorcee Ellie, provides a strong and unique voice for the first person narrative. Enough bad/mysterious stuff happened to Ellie to keep me turning pages.
And yet, it felt to me like there was no 'about' to this story, no central core upon which the plot was built.
Basically, the plot goes like this: Ellie is a wounded Iraq vet living in China because that's where she and her husband moved before they got divorced. Ellie is friends and sometimes lovers with a Chinese artist named Lao Zhang. One day, Lao Zhang goes missing, and suddenly Ellie finds herself constantly being followed by American G-men and shady Chinese officials. Not knowing what else to do, she sets off running across China in search of answers from a shadowy guild that operates out of a Chinese MMO.
See, it sounds exciting when I put it like that. There's a lot of elements here for a tight, compelling thriller. But Brackmann never quite manages to weave it all together. There's no there there.
Ellie's back-story of being an army medic who is wounded, meets her husband, and stumbles onto the seedier side of the military's Iraq operations unfolds in parallel to the main story. The reader would expect that this means that something in Ellie's past is going to wind up being a key or clue to what's happening to her now, but no. We learn her (sad, sordid) history, and that's it.
It's not clear why we can't be told early on that Ellie is in China because she moved there with her husband before she caught him cheating on her Or that her bad leg is due to a run-in with a stray artillery shell. In fact it might help us understand Ellie better if we knew these things up front. But instead the author takes until the last third of the book to fill in these fundamental blanks, without the payoff that late game revelations usually bring.
One would expect Ellie's accidental discovery of torture and interrogation in Iraq to be a clue to why the g-men are after her, but it's not. The actual reasons she is being pursued turn out to be rather mundane, just a string of coincidence and a bad case of being in the wrong places at the wrong times.
Ellie is looking for answers and the reader is too, but Lisa Brackmann offers up very few. Imagine a murder mystery where the detective never figures out whodunnit 100% for sure. I hesitate to be more specific because I don't want to spoil anything, not that there's really much to spoil.
Still, there's a non-essential sub-plot that illustrates the problem marvelously: Ellie's Percocet supply. Ellie takes Percocet to control the pain in her leg. As the book starts she has a limited supply of pills left and no way to get more. As the story advances, she gets lower and lower on Percocet. What will she do when she runs out, you wonder? How will she cope? The author has clearly spent time building up this Percocet sub-plot. She must have some sort of payoff in mind.
Ellie takes her last Percocet, and the pills are never mentioned again.
I feel like the author didn't quite grasp some of the basic principals of storytelling.
As the protagonist of a thriller, Ellie is disappointing. She has virtually no agency in this story. Nothing she does seems to matter. She is extricated from her problems by the same thing that got her into them: sheer coincidence. On the one hand it's refreshing to have a character who doesn't suddenly turn into an action hero in the last act of the book. On the other hand we want our protagonists to do something. Ellie doesn't do anything except run.
The only real progression in the story comes from Ellie's character, and even that is slight. At the beginning of the book she is aimless, at loose ends thanks to her divorce and her bad leg. By the end of the book she has been given a purpose. Not found, been given! In between point a) and point b) Ellie runs away a lot, reflects on her poor life decisions, and makes more of them. Seriously, I want to sympathize with the character, but over and over her response to being on her own in a dangerous situation with mysterious forces pursuing her is to get drunk. You can imagine how well that usually works out.
I'm torn about whether I should give this author another try. I feel like with just a little extra effort Lisa Brackmann could turn in a really taut, vividly written thriller. On the other hand she strung me along for an entire book with a story that had no point.
Hey! I've thought up a one-sentence summary for the book: "Bad stuff starts happening to divorced Iraq vet Ellie in China, and then it stops and she never really figures out the reason for it."
What do you think?
"Describe what your book is about in one sentence" is one of those daft creative writing exercises teachers love to assign. They can be pretty tedious, but the one-sentence-summary CAN serve as a useful reality check to make sure that the book you are writing is about something. It certainly would have served author Lisa Brackmann well in her first outing.
Brackmann's writing shows promise: her depictions of modern China in all its self-contradictory glory ring vivid and true. Her central character, Iraq war veteran and divorcee Ellie, provides a strong and unique voice for the first person narrative. Enough bad/mysterious stuff happened to Ellie to keep me turning pages.
And yet, it felt to me like there was no 'about' to this story, no central core upon which the plot was built.
Basically, the plot goes like this: Ellie is a wounded Iraq vet living in China because that's where she and her husband moved before they got divorced. Ellie is friends and sometimes lovers with a Chinese artist named Lao Zhang. One day, Lao Zhang goes missing, and suddenly Ellie finds herself constantly being followed by American G-men and shady Chinese officials. Not knowing what else to do, she sets off running across China in search of answers from a shadowy guild that operates out of a Chinese MMO.
See, it sounds exciting when I put it like that. There's a lot of elements here for a tight, compelling thriller. But Brackmann never quite manages to weave it all together. There's no there there.
Ellie's back-story of being an army medic who is wounded, meets her husband, and stumbles onto the seedier side of the military's Iraq operations unfolds in parallel to the main story. The reader would expect that this means that something in Ellie's past is going to wind up being a key or clue to what's happening to her now, but no. We learn her (sad, sordid) history, and that's it.
It's not clear why we can't be told early on that Ellie is in China because she moved there with her husband before she caught him cheating on her Or that her bad leg is due to a run-in with a stray artillery shell. In fact it might help us understand Ellie better if we knew these things up front. But instead the author takes until the last third of the book to fill in these fundamental blanks, without the payoff that late game revelations usually bring.
One would expect Ellie's accidental discovery of torture and interrogation in Iraq to be a clue to why the g-men are after her, but it's not. The actual reasons she is being pursued turn out to be rather mundane, just a string of coincidence and a bad case of being in the wrong places at the wrong times.
Ellie is looking for answers and the reader is too, but Lisa Brackmann offers up very few. Imagine a murder mystery where the detective never figures out whodunnit 100% for sure. I hesitate to be more specific because I don't want to spoil anything, not that there's really much to spoil.
Still, there's a non-essential sub-plot that illustrates the problem marvelously: Ellie's Percocet supply. Ellie takes Percocet to control the pain in her leg. As the book starts she has a limited supply of pills left and no way to get more. As the story advances, she gets lower and lower on Percocet. What will she do when she runs out, you wonder? How will she cope? The author has clearly spent time building up this Percocet sub-plot. She must have some sort of payoff in mind.
Ellie takes her last Percocet, and the pills are never mentioned again.
I feel like the author didn't quite grasp some of the basic principals of storytelling.
As the protagonist of a thriller, Ellie is disappointing. She has virtually no agency in this story. Nothing she does seems to matter. She is extricated from her problems by the same thing that got her into them: sheer coincidence. On the one hand it's refreshing to have a character who doesn't suddenly turn into an action hero in the last act of the book. On the other hand we want our protagonists to do something. Ellie doesn't do anything except run.
The only real progression in the story comes from Ellie's character, and even that is slight. At the beginning of the book she is aimless, at loose ends thanks to her divorce and her bad leg. By the end of the book she has been given a purpose. Not found, been given! In between point a) and point b) Ellie runs away a lot, reflects on her poor life decisions, and makes more of them. Seriously, I want to sympathize with the character, but over and over her response to being on her own in a dangerous situation with mysterious forces pursuing her is to get drunk. You can imagine how well that usually works out.
I'm torn about whether I should give this author another try. I feel like with just a little extra effort Lisa Brackmann could turn in a really taut, vividly written thriller. On the other hand she strung me along for an entire book with a story that had no point.
Hey! I've thought up a one-sentence summary for the book: "Bad stuff starts happening to divorced Iraq vet Ellie in China, and then it stops and she never really figures out the reason for it."
What do you think?
June 9, 2010
ROCK PAPER TIGER
~Lisa Brackmann
· Hardcover: 368 pages
· Publisher: Soho Press; First Edition edition (June 1, 2010)
· Language: English
Iraq vet Ellie McEnroe is down and out in China, trying to lose herself in the alien worlds of performance artists and online gamers. When a chance encounter with a Uighur fugitive drops her down a rabbit hole of conspiracies, Ellie must decide whom to trust among the artists, dealers, collectors and operatives claiming to be on her side – in particular, a mysterious organization operating within a popular online game.
Lisa Brackmann’s remarkable debut novel, Rock Paper Tiger is a well-crafted adventure in Modern China. Told from the point of view of, Ellie McEnroe, a former enlisted Medic who did a traumatic tour at a detention center in Iraq and in the process was severely injured—both in body and soul. Brought to China and basically abandoned by her husband, she is trying to figure out who she is now and deal with the effects of PTSD. She has made new friends and a new life for herself while coming to terms with her husband’s actions and dealing with the horrors she saw while on tour in Iraq (readers are fed this secondary story in bits and pieces as a explanatory counterpoint to the main story and very well done actually).
Through Ellie’s eyes we can see the consequences of being in the wrong place at the wrong time and the result of becoming a person of interest by both Chinese and American agents. She doesn’t know who to trust or where to turn, but war has made her tough and surprisingly resourceful. Ellie’s story shows us a side of modern China that few westerners see and Ms. Brackmann is very good at creating the atmosphere of modern day China and putting the reader there.
Ms. Brackmann calls her storytelling a “Magpie method—look something shiny and interesting—yet she skillfully pulls all the pieces together in a well told suspense with a believable world peopled with distinctive characters. She successfully constructs tension and fear in a life and death situation and produces a complex fast paced suspense.
While there is an element of romance in the story, this is not a romance, so don’t expect a pat, happily ever after ending. Without giving away spoilers, there is a definite character arc to Ellie from a depressed, drifting soul trying to heal to one of optimism as she becomes proactive rather than merely reactive and takes charge of her life.
~Lisa Brackmann
· Hardcover: 368 pages
· Publisher: Soho Press; First Edition edition (June 1, 2010)
· Language: English
Iraq vet Ellie McEnroe is down and out in China, trying to lose herself in the alien worlds of performance artists and online gamers. When a chance encounter with a Uighur fugitive drops her down a rabbit hole of conspiracies, Ellie must decide whom to trust among the artists, dealers, collectors and operatives claiming to be on her side – in particular, a mysterious organization operating within a popular online game.
Lisa Brackmann’s remarkable debut novel, Rock Paper Tiger is a well-crafted adventure in Modern China. Told from the point of view of, Ellie McEnroe, a former enlisted Medic who did a traumatic tour at a detention center in Iraq and in the process was severely injured—both in body and soul. Brought to China and basically abandoned by her husband, she is trying to figure out who she is now and deal with the effects of PTSD. She has made new friends and a new life for herself while coming to terms with her husband’s actions and dealing with the horrors she saw while on tour in Iraq (readers are fed this secondary story in bits and pieces as a explanatory counterpoint to the main story and very well done actually).
Through Ellie’s eyes we can see the consequences of being in the wrong place at the wrong time and the result of becoming a person of interest by both Chinese and American agents. She doesn’t know who to trust or where to turn, but war has made her tough and surprisingly resourceful. Ellie’s story shows us a side of modern China that few westerners see and Ms. Brackmann is very good at creating the atmosphere of modern day China and putting the reader there.
Ms. Brackmann calls her storytelling a “Magpie method—look something shiny and interesting—yet she skillfully pulls all the pieces together in a well told suspense with a believable world peopled with distinctive characters. She successfully constructs tension and fear in a life and death situation and produces a complex fast paced suspense.
While there is an element of romance in the story, this is not a romance, so don’t expect a pat, happily ever after ending. Without giving away spoilers, there is a definite character arc to Ellie from a depressed, drifting soul trying to heal to one of optimism as she becomes proactive rather than merely reactive and takes charge of her life.
August 3, 2017
I stumbled onto to Rock Paper Tiger after it was named one of the Top 10 Fiction Books So Far (for 2010) and coupled with (at the time) a nearly perfect 5-star average rating, plus having an interest in China since visiting Beijing for the 2008 Olympics, this thriller seemed right up my alley.
I will admit I like to blend into the crowd and can be influenced by the opinion of others, but during and after this one, I was kind of wondering if we had all read the same book. I will say it was very readable, averaging 50+ pages a day on it, but that is about all the good I can say about it. I was expecting a smart and complex thriller with a plucky heroine and found it to be simple and flat with a "That's it/all?" resolution. All this was not helped by our protagonist, Iraq war veteran Ellie Cooper, who I did not find particularly engaging or likable, though at least she was fleshed out enough for me to have an opinion about her versus the other cast of two-dimensional characters. While the book distinguishes itself a bit with its China locales, I just wish a bit less time was spent in Starbucks franchises.
No regrets about the time spent reading it (which again to Brackmann's credit wasn't much), but still left scratching my head over all the superlatives.
I will admit I like to blend into the crowd and can be influenced by the opinion of others, but during and after this one, I was kind of wondering if we had all read the same book. I will say it was very readable, averaging 50+ pages a day on it, but that is about all the good I can say about it. I was expecting a smart and complex thriller with a plucky heroine and found it to be simple and flat with a "That's it/all?" resolution. All this was not helped by our protagonist, Iraq war veteran Ellie Cooper, who I did not find particularly engaging or likable, though at least she was fleshed out enough for me to have an opinion about her versus the other cast of two-dimensional characters. While the book distinguishes itself a bit with its China locales, I just wish a bit less time was spent in Starbucks franchises.
No regrets about the time spent reading it (which again to Brackmann's credit wasn't much), but still left scratching my head over all the superlatives.
March 1, 2012
I'm not sure what I can say to do this novel justice, except to say Ellie Cooper is my kind of girl. Smart, brave, irreverent and funny, yet somehow, directionless and definitely, all too human. She's an American expat in China, previously wounded in the Iraq war, now abandoned by her husband who leaves her for a Chinese woman. When her friend/lover Lao Zhang, an artist, disappears under somewhat mysterious circumstances, Ellie finds herself in trouble with both the American and the Chinese government (they want to know where Lao is) and as they pursue her through China, she learns to stand up for herself, ultimately finding the answer to what she should do next with her life (there is more than a little pain, both emotional and physical, involved). Brackmann weaves Ellie's troubled past in the Iraq war with her present in China and makes both experiences come brilliantly alive. An excellent novel!
January 6, 2011
This is a fine book which brings today's China to life. Ellie, the main character, is an expatriate living in China. Her relationship with her husband has gone south, but she's made a bunch of new friends who have a wide diversity of backgrounds. Her normal life gets turned upside down and the chase is on, as a mysterious set of men in suits pursue her for reasons she doesn't really fathom. She leaves Beijing and we get glimpses of other cities and what it's like to travel between them low-rent style. The book has a lot of forward energy, but also touches on the strangeness that comes from being in a different country. This was definitely one of the best books I read in 2010.
April 14, 2011
Fabulous! But then, given all the hoopla surrounding this book, that shouldn't come as a surprise. :)
Disclaimer - I am mentioned in the acknowledgments, but the only reason that affects my rating of this book is because I knew it was great when I was reading parts of it for Lisa.
Disclaimer - I am mentioned in the acknowledgments, but the only reason that affects my rating of this book is because I knew it was great when I was reading parts of it for Lisa.
April 8, 2011
Ellie (Chinese name, Yili) describes the dilapidated squalor of her environs in Haidian Qu, and the reader is instantly drawn in. How did she, an American woman, get here? More hints are dropped – her leg hurts so badly that she alleviates the pain with a dwindling supply of percocet. She has some interesting friends, including a serious artist named Lao Zhang, a painter and performance artist in the “Mati Village” district, an artist colony on the norther outskirts of Beijing. Her roommate, Chuckie, is a geeky online gamer with the screen name of Eloquent Evergreen Monkey in “The Sword of Ill-Repute” - a World of Warcraft type of role-playing game. Ellie's avatar is Little Mountain Tiger and Lao Zhang's screen name is Upright Boar. Ellie met Lao Zhang through Chuckie – mutual “Sword” enthusiasts. These are all characters of heightened intensity, and we believe in them because they are part of this millieu of artists never quite safe from the scrutiny of the authorities or the duplicity of political barter.
The narrative alternates between Ellie's past, her present pursuit by two threatening “suits” who might be government agents or worse -- freelance security contractors -- and the mysterious online gaming characters who drop veiled hints about the danger she and Lao Zhang (who has gone into hiding) are in. We see these characters through Ellie's eyes and because of that, the reader is always kept in suspense: Which of these characters are friends and which are threats motivated by private agendas? It is also because of this subjective viewpoint that the reader is drawn to Ellie, a blend of vulnerability and tough defensiveness.
ROCK, PAPER, TIGER by Lisa Brackmann is alive from page one. The environs are described with intense vividness: “I'm living in this dump in Haidian Qu, close to Wudaokou, on the twenty-first floor of a decaying high-rise. The grounds are bare; the trees have died; the rubber tiles on the walkways, in their garish pink and yellow, are cracked and curling.” That's from the very first paragraph. The Chinese references add to the authenticity. Characters greet each other with the traditional “ni hao.” When beer flows, its Yanjing or Quingdao . At one point a character tentatively remarks to Ellie: “Hong xian....It is about fate....It is the red thread that tangles but does not break. It is the thing that connects some people to each other. Because they are meant to be connected.”
This is a character centered book, and it concludes with a satisfying sense of character growth, even if we feel some sense of loss at the resolution of the plot.
The narrative alternates between Ellie's past, her present pursuit by two threatening “suits” who might be government agents or worse -- freelance security contractors -- and the mysterious online gaming characters who drop veiled hints about the danger she and Lao Zhang (who has gone into hiding) are in. We see these characters through Ellie's eyes and because of that, the reader is always kept in suspense: Which of these characters are friends and which are threats motivated by private agendas? It is also because of this subjective viewpoint that the reader is drawn to Ellie, a blend of vulnerability and tough defensiveness.
ROCK, PAPER, TIGER by Lisa Brackmann is alive from page one. The environs are described with intense vividness: “I'm living in this dump in Haidian Qu, close to Wudaokou, on the twenty-first floor of a decaying high-rise. The grounds are bare; the trees have died; the rubber tiles on the walkways, in their garish pink and yellow, are cracked and curling.” That's from the very first paragraph. The Chinese references add to the authenticity. Characters greet each other with the traditional “ni hao.” When beer flows, its Yanjing or Quingdao . At one point a character tentatively remarks to Ellie: “Hong xian....It is about fate....It is the red thread that tangles but does not break. It is the thing that connects some people to each other. Because they are meant to be connected.”
This is a character centered book, and it concludes with a satisfying sense of character growth, even if we feel some sense of loss at the resolution of the plot.
October 26, 2011
This book was awesome on so many levels. Let me just list what I loved:
Ellie - the protagonist is just... wow. Yeah. I guess a lot of other readers disliked her quite strongly, but for me she totally resonated. I've always gravitated towards books with men as the protagonists, because women protagonists always seemed either too emotional or were just men with boobs. Ellie is not me - we have totally different beliefs, different education levels, different life experiences - but she THINKS like me. She's a woman and she's real and I found myself identifying with her no-nonsense matter-of-fact unromantic attitude in a way I don't think I've ever experienced in a book before. She also experiences very organic, realistic transformation and growth, as we see her both in the past and present. Spot on, all the way.
China - So, I lived in China for a year. And I can say that Brackmann's completely captured what it's like for a foreigner. I think readers who haven't visited China will enjoy the sort of grungy reality portrayed, while those who have spent significant time in China will find themselves laughing at some of the details Brackmann drops here and there, like hidden jokes. The couple watching the tiny TV in the Great Wall tower was so, so perfect.
Writing - Brackmann can definitely write. The pacing, the dialogue, everything - perfect.
I gave this book five stars, so obviously I love it, but there were a couple of things I think could have been better:
Plot - We spend most of the book, like Ellie, totally in the dark about what's happening and who's chasing her. It gets wrapped up in a very satisfactory manner by the last page (thank goodness), but I personally would have liked more clues earlier on, so I could at least feel like I was piecing things together. That said, I think part of Ellie's situation was being in this country with people who are culturally so different from her that it's often impossible to tell what people want, even when they think they're being very clear.
Politics - I felt like the very end of the book came down a LITTLE too heavy on the "message." Ellie basically just says what she learned, and it feels a little too much like moralizing. I could have done with a little more ambiguity. But then that's just me.
Overall, a fantastic read. Going on my top shelf.
Ellie - the protagonist is just... wow. Yeah. I guess a lot of other readers disliked her quite strongly, but for me she totally resonated. I've always gravitated towards books with men as the protagonists, because women protagonists always seemed either too emotional or were just men with boobs. Ellie is not me - we have totally different beliefs, different education levels, different life experiences - but she THINKS like me. She's a woman and she's real and I found myself identifying with her no-nonsense matter-of-fact unromantic attitude in a way I don't think I've ever experienced in a book before. She also experiences very organic, realistic transformation and growth, as we see her both in the past and present. Spot on, all the way.
China - So, I lived in China for a year. And I can say that Brackmann's completely captured what it's like for a foreigner. I think readers who haven't visited China will enjoy the sort of grungy reality portrayed, while those who have spent significant time in China will find themselves laughing at some of the details Brackmann drops here and there, like hidden jokes. The couple watching the tiny TV in the Great Wall tower was so, so perfect.
Writing - Brackmann can definitely write. The pacing, the dialogue, everything - perfect.
I gave this book five stars, so obviously I love it, but there were a couple of things I think could have been better:
Plot - We spend most of the book, like Ellie, totally in the dark about what's happening and who's chasing her. It gets wrapped up in a very satisfactory manner by the last page (thank goodness), but I personally would have liked more clues earlier on, so I could at least feel like I was piecing things together. That said, I think part of Ellie's situation was being in this country with people who are culturally so different from her that it's often impossible to tell what people want, even when they think they're being very clear.
Politics - I felt like the very end of the book came down a LITTLE too heavy on the "message." Ellie basically just says what she learned, and it feels a little too much like moralizing. I could have done with a little more ambiguity. But then that's just me.
Overall, a fantastic read. Going on my top shelf.
November 18, 2011
Ellie Cooper wasn't supposed to see those things. Not all those years ago when she was a military medic in Iraq. Not today in her sometime-lover's apartment in Beijing. They were accidents, but now something she saw has Ellie on the run for her life, pursued by a plethora of shadowy, alphabet-soup-initialed agencies.
In this action-packed suspense thriller, war veteran Ellie Cooper has been stumbling through life--literally and figuratively--since her tour of duty in Iraq left her with a damaged leg, a faithless husband, and a desperate need to figure out what to do with the rest of her life. The problem is, if she can't first figure out what her pursuers want from her, the rest of her life may be counted in minutes.
Underlying the breakneck pace of this page-turner is an extraordinary attention to detail, lush, savory descriptions, and the occasional wry humor that make Ellie and her world-view deliciously three dimensional.
The scenes in Iraq are gritty, dark, and gut-wrenching. Just as the author writes about the Iraqi desert wringing every drop of moisture from the human body, so the author's words wring every drop of emotion from the reader.
But it is in the action in China where the author truly shines. Ms. Brackmann has travelled and worked extensively in that country, and her love for it--and her acknowledgment of the practical realities and darker underbelly of that enigmatic place--are the true strength of this book. Her understanding of the massive geopolitical and economic force that is China is amazing. Yet, like the artist whose life and work is the at the heart of Ellie Cooper's world and this book, Ms. Brackmann manages, with taut, spare brushstrokes, to paint intimate portraits and character sketches of the people and realities of China today. In what is ultimately a quest tale, the author seamlessly blends edge-of-your-seat action with the Alice-Through-the-Looking-Glass world of a sprawling, messy, corrupt and beautiful country.
I will be anxiously awaiting future works from this fierce, extraordinary debut author.
In this action-packed suspense thriller, war veteran Ellie Cooper has been stumbling through life--literally and figuratively--since her tour of duty in Iraq left her with a damaged leg, a faithless husband, and a desperate need to figure out what to do with the rest of her life. The problem is, if she can't first figure out what her pursuers want from her, the rest of her life may be counted in minutes.
Underlying the breakneck pace of this page-turner is an extraordinary attention to detail, lush, savory descriptions, and the occasional wry humor that make Ellie and her world-view deliciously three dimensional.
The scenes in Iraq are gritty, dark, and gut-wrenching. Just as the author writes about the Iraqi desert wringing every drop of moisture from the human body, so the author's words wring every drop of emotion from the reader.
But it is in the action in China where the author truly shines. Ms. Brackmann has travelled and worked extensively in that country, and her love for it--and her acknowledgment of the practical realities and darker underbelly of that enigmatic place--are the true strength of this book. Her understanding of the massive geopolitical and economic force that is China is amazing. Yet, like the artist whose life and work is the at the heart of Ellie Cooper's world and this book, Ms. Brackmann manages, with taut, spare brushstrokes, to paint intimate portraits and character sketches of the people and realities of China today. In what is ultimately a quest tale, the author seamlessly blends edge-of-your-seat action with the Alice-Through-the-Looking-Glass world of a sprawling, messy, corrupt and beautiful country.
I will be anxiously awaiting future works from this fierce, extraordinary debut author.
July 20, 2011
I fell in love with Rock Paper Tiger on impact. I was expecting an entertaining read, and instead I found literary excellence.
It's the story of Ellie - a 26-year-old ex-military medic living in Beijing. Crazy things start happening to her that can only be answered inside an online game.
Things I love:
The way the book took me to China - to the hip and modern side of Beijing. The story is peppered with social commentary that accents the story with depth and humor simultaneously (go figure). I've spent very little time in China, and I love the way Rock Paper Tiger enhanced my own observations, showed the loud cell phone talkers who annoyed me on the train and the crazy English signs that made me laugh, and at the same time took me down the alleys I haven't explored on my own.
The humor. Lisa Brackmann is a master of slicingly funny one-liners. Ellie speaks and thinks with a bluntness I both relish and admire. I know she's a fictional character, but I want to meet her one day. In life, I like people who cut through the bullshit and speak real, like she does.
The writing. Seriously, there isn't even a comma out of place. The book pulls readers running through Beijing, setting the scene along the way with vivid description that never slows the plot down. Dialogue is snappy and true; each character speaks with a distinct voice. It reminds me of J.D. Salinger for the dark humor and sheer genius.
The plot. It's original, fun, and suspenseful. I care what happens. If I read in bed, I drifted off to sleep into the land of the online game.
As a writer, I studied this book intensely, trying to learn from it to improve my own writing.
As a reader, I'm excited to find a new writer whose books I can devour every one of.
It's the story of Ellie - a 26-year-old ex-military medic living in Beijing. Crazy things start happening to her that can only be answered inside an online game.
Things I love:
The way the book took me to China - to the hip and modern side of Beijing. The story is peppered with social commentary that accents the story with depth and humor simultaneously (go figure). I've spent very little time in China, and I love the way Rock Paper Tiger enhanced my own observations, showed the loud cell phone talkers who annoyed me on the train and the crazy English signs that made me laugh, and at the same time took me down the alleys I haven't explored on my own.
The humor. Lisa Brackmann is a master of slicingly funny one-liners. Ellie speaks and thinks with a bluntness I both relish and admire. I know she's a fictional character, but I want to meet her one day. In life, I like people who cut through the bullshit and speak real, like she does.
The writing. Seriously, there isn't even a comma out of place. The book pulls readers running through Beijing, setting the scene along the way with vivid description that never slows the plot down. Dialogue is snappy and true; each character speaks with a distinct voice. It reminds me of J.D. Salinger for the dark humor and sheer genius.
The plot. It's original, fun, and suspenseful. I care what happens. If I read in bed, I drifted off to sleep into the land of the online game.
As a writer, I studied this book intensely, trying to learn from it to improve my own writing.
As a reader, I'm excited to find a new writer whose books I can devour every one of.
October 7, 2022
For a debut novel, RPT has a lot going for it - an exotic setting well-described, and a unique and realistic first-person voice; it also has a really clever title and an eye-catching cover.
However, story-wise it is awfully thin. The whole book reads like "The Fugitive," except without, I dunno, an actual plot - or at least one that doesn't turn out to be a total MacGuffin, which is way-too-facilely dealt with in one closing conversation where "all is explained." The book also suffers from at least two too many "Lord of the Rings"-type multiple endings, (but then I'm no one to talk about not knowing when to stop writing).
Having just finished the surprisingly enjoyable Mrs Pollifax On China Station - a more-or-less spy story set in similar parts of China but 25 years earlier - I found the present-day China setting fascinating but also (at least for me) both disheartening and unsettling. I knew China back in the mid-80s, and while it certainly wasn't free, it also wasn’t the all-pervasive surveillance - and relententlessly materialistic - state that it appears to be here. Art gallery raves, goofy performance art, all-night videogame parlors, insane wealth disparities and a Starbucks on every corner - is that all that China gained from opening up to the West?
Overall, glad I read it - but probably won't read either of the sequels. And old fart that I am, I'm also really glad I visited China "back in the day," before all…this.
However, story-wise it is awfully thin. The whole book reads like "The Fugitive," except without, I dunno, an actual plot - or at least one that doesn't turn out to be a total MacGuffin, which is way-too-facilely dealt with in one closing conversation where "all is explained." The book also suffers from at least two too many "Lord of the Rings"-type multiple endings, (but then I'm no one to talk about not knowing when to stop writing).
Having just finished the surprisingly enjoyable Mrs Pollifax On China Station - a more-or-less spy story set in similar parts of China but 25 years earlier - I found the present-day China setting fascinating but also (at least for me) both disheartening and unsettling. I knew China back in the mid-80s, and while it certainly wasn't free, it also wasn’t the all-pervasive surveillance - and relententlessly materialistic - state that it appears to be here. Art gallery raves, goofy performance art, all-night videogame parlors, insane wealth disparities and a Starbucks on every corner - is that all that China gained from opening up to the West?
Overall, glad I read it - but probably won't read either of the sequels. And old fart that I am, I'm also really glad I visited China "back in the day," before all…this.
October 7, 2010
Ellie is a veteran of the Iraq war, suffering from PTSD and a leg injury sustained during her tour of duty. She's living in China after her husband, whom she met while in Iraq, dumped her for another woman. She is living day by day, doing what she can to survive, making new friends, and trying to sort out the mess her life has become. She becomes close to a Chinese artist, Lao Zhang, and though their relationship isn't well defined, she considers him her closet friend. One night, feeling lonely and bored she calls Lao to see if she can come visit. He reluctantly agrees but when Ellie arrives, Lao isn't there. A stranger is asleep in one of the rooms and upon hearing Ellie, he wakes and come out to speak to her. And thus begins a convoluted and complicated story of international intrigue, double-crosses, and the terrifying world of politics and the treatment of political prisoners.
I don't quite understand what happened or why but the story kept me turning pages past my bedtime. I didn't know who was good, who was bad, and who could be trusted. I suppose that's the way Ellie felt, too. A few times I was really wondering why she made the choices she did and I had to just go with it to see how things resolved. Some of the relationships didn't make sense to me but as I said, I'm STILL not sure I really understood what happened.
All in all, a good thriller with enough action to keep you turning pages. I hope to read more from Ms. Brackman.
I don't quite understand what happened or why but the story kept me turning pages past my bedtime. I didn't know who was good, who was bad, and who could be trusted. I suppose that's the way Ellie felt, too. A few times I was really wondering why she made the choices she did and I had to just go with it to see how things resolved. Some of the relationships didn't make sense to me but as I said, I'm STILL not sure I really understood what happened.
All in all, a good thriller with enough action to keep you turning pages. I hope to read more from Ms. Brackman.
August 5, 2016
Others might say this is a fantastic first novel (or whatever number it is), that it's a great plot with interesting characters, etc etc etc.
But if it wasn't on my iPod, which is the only consistent reading apparatus I have, I'd have thrown the book across the room. As it is, I'm a bit surprised I finished it. I wasn't interested enough in the occurences, the characters, anything to justify reading all 300-some pages. The only reason I went ahead with it, actually, was because I only realized how pointless the book was about 90 pages in (I'm pretty tolerant, so I didn't set it aside until too late), and by then a 90 page investment was a bit pointless to throw out, especially when I didn't have enough books for a particular Toppler category as it was.
So I read the book. And there were interesting pieces— the use of the video game, for instance. But I really would like to know why a character is favoring a leg right off— at least a mention that it's a war wound, specifically from a bomb, would have been nice. As it was, I found myself rolling my eyes at the fact that this is the hook.
But if it wasn't on my iPod, which is the only consistent reading apparatus I have, I'd have thrown the book across the room. As it is, I'm a bit surprised I finished it. I wasn't interested enough in the occurences, the characters, anything to justify reading all 300-some pages. The only reason I went ahead with it, actually, was because I only realized how pointless the book was about 90 pages in (I'm pretty tolerant, so I didn't set it aside until too late), and by then a 90 page investment was a bit pointless to throw out, especially when I didn't have enough books for a particular Toppler category as it was.
So I read the book. And there were interesting pieces— the use of the video game, for instance. But I really would like to know why a character is favoring a leg right off— at least a mention that it's a war wound, specifically from a bomb, would have been nice. As it was, I found myself rolling my eyes at the fact that this is the hook.
July 16, 2011
I was fascinated from beginning to end by this book about a young American Iraq war veteran living in China. Ellie/Yili is married to Trey (who is divorcing her), who she met at "Camp Falafel" in Iraq. As she struggles to live with the "crime" they both committed in Iraq, she becomes involved with the world of visual and performance artists in China, primarily Beijing. The way Brackmann intertwines the war in Iraq, dissident Chinese artists, gaming, lost souls, and global politics is masterful, especially considering this is her first novel. Ellie is a wonderful character. I hope to see more of her in future novels. This novel made me remember another, The Dissident, by Nell Freudenberger (2006) also a first novel about dissident artists in China. It isn't as good as Rock Paper Tiger, but if it is a subject that interests you, it's worth checking out.
February 17, 2017
Truly enjoyed this thriller set in China with a vast and intriguing cast of characters. The flashbacks to the heroine, Ellie's time as a medic in Iraq were very interesting to her character development. The setting in China took us to a different place. I would definitely read another book in the series.
September 13, 2010
I'm not big on mysteries but this one caught and held me. The settings were interesting--the working-class end of Beijing and the lesser cities of China. The main character is a female vet of the current Iraq war who came out with a pile of emotional disabilities plus a bum leg--not the sort that gets much attention. It's an interesting look into the controls used in modern China to keep a lid on too much "togetherness" (a contradiction in a Communist society?) and the downsides of the art and online gaming worlds.
July 31, 2016
A good international/political thriller that probably paints an accurate picture of the mix that is modern-day China, as well as the after-effects (physical, mental, emotional) affecting soldiers who served in Iraq.
I enjoyed it enough that I would read more of Brackmann's books.
I enjoyed it enough that I would read more of Brackmann's books.
June 14, 2010
Has the gritty detailed feel an author can only get from having been there, in this case to China.
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