‘I had been waiting to arrive somewhere for so long, and now that I was here, I wanted only to roll backward in time, to swim upstream until I sat at the font of something, to avoid ending up as this unbearable me.’
‘We were both conceptual orphans. Perhaps that is the condition of any second generation. In the space between us and the rest of adulthood lay a great expanse of the unknown. We had not grown up imbibing stories that implicitly conveyed answers to the basic questions of being: What did it feel like to fall in love in America, to take oneself for granted in America? Starved as we were for clues about how to live, we would grip like mad on to anything that lent a possible way of being.’
Reading this book after She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan was an interesting choice. This was a book club read for March 2022. I devoured the first half of this book in less than a day or so, and read the remainder over the rest of the week while struggling to stay focused on an impending term paper. (…That I still need to finish. Sigh.) I mention that book because both novels deal primarily with the theme of ambition and feature flawed characters. However, Gold Diggers was a much more engaging read for me because of Sathian’s engaging writing style and her deft handling of the characters and themes. (Her writing pedigree certainly speaks volumes! Kudos on the debut novel.)Of course, the biggest theme is all over the place: gold. Gold digging, the California Gold Rush, ‘Gold Digger’ by Kanye… it’s all there. Gold is like a familiar landmark throughout the novel, anchoring you every time it makes an appearance. It is closely intertwined with the major theme, ambition—particularly in the second-generation immigrant experience. But Sathian weaves it into the narrative perfectly, almost seamlessly; it doesn’t feel repetitive or overdone. In general, her writing impressed me a ton. Moreover, the theme of ambition is ever present; and unlike my previous read, here Sathian actually plots the consequences and costs of ambition throughout the narrative—as you go along Neil’s story, you see exactly what cost he has borne by virtue of his ambition as he attempts to achieve his familial expectations.Now, full confession: I went into this book expecting to hate it. (Maybe that’s the trick—just have low expectations and books will automatically seem better.) I don’t really read stories about the Indian-American experience, because I expect it to be cringe and reside in that weirdly familiar but off-putting uncanny valley territory—like looking into a mirror but seeing some other face there. I’m not someone who has spent a lot of time thinking about my own identity in these terms. Growing up, none of my friends were the same ethnicity as me, and even now, surprisingly, I have very few friends who are Indian. (Surprising because there are just so many of us, scattered everywhere!) I shock people when I tell them I hate most Indian food because my spice tolerance is at jalapenos-are-spicy level. In other words, I’m a coconut—and so is Neil, the protagonist of this novel. I felt ‘seen’ by this book, and it was a novel and exciting experience.Neil is an extremely flawed character. Again, unlike my previous read, he has depth and a complex inner life that endears him somewhat to the reader. He does a lot of weird and embarrassing things, and his obsession with his neighbor, Anita, probably tips over into the unhinged zone a few times. (It definitely made me cringe a little.) Despite that, his experience growing up and wrestling with his sense of self as a second-generation immigrant was incredibly relatable. Sathian’s voice is incredible—I had to double check that this was written by a woman, because I rarely see the teen male perspective written in all its fully awkward and listless glory (or simply as deserving of nuance). Neil’s first-person narration took some getting used to, to be sure, but every time a spot of Hinglish popped up, it felt almost like sliding into my own life. Of course, I didn’t grow up in the suburbs or in an upper middle-class Hindu family; far from it, indeed. But the cultural elements were so familiar. I could imagine my mother saying exactly the things Neil’s mother says.Some of the other reviews I’ve seen complain that Neil is boring or that the novel should’ve been told from the Dayal women’s perspectives. I do think that the latter would be interesting, but I find it funny that the same reviews that complain about Neil as a character also mention that they know someone just like him in real life. Neil is not necessarily a great guy; I probably wouldn’t want to hang out with him. But Sathian nevertheless depicts him as a complex character, so that you end up sympathizing with him anyway. (Also, it helps that ‘meandering grad student flailing around trying to write a dissertation’ is exactly my life right now, sigh.) So yeah, weirdly enough, I could see a bit of myself in Neil, and that was disconcerting at first, but also fascinating.The mythology and magical realism of the novel were also well done. Sathian has clearly done her research on the Gold Rush era. I’m not familiar with magical realism, but I liked how the fantastical elements more or less seamlessly blend into the story. The novel isn’t really about the lemonade; it’s about how the characters react and deal with the lemonade, and their obsession for gold. The heist, as promised in the blurb, was also enjoyable. Despite the large time jump in between parts 1 and 2, I didn’t have much trouble reacquainting myself with the plot thread—and it was odd, in a slightly unfamiliar way, to be reading about things like the 2016 election in a novel. It all seems so recent still… and maybe it’s that I don’t often read contemporary lit, but it made it feel all the more tangible.While I greatly enjoyed this book, of course, it was not a perfect read. Sometimes the plot meandered and Neil’s descriptions got a bit long-winded. Some of the minor characters felt like mere decoration and of little substance. Even some of the actions of Anjali were questionable, and her storyline felt rushed in the last third of the book. But, coming from my recent string of disappointing reads, this was a pleasant surprise—and perhaps for that reason a lot more enjoyable.
