Named A Best Book of Spring 2020 by Real Simple ·Parade · PopSugar · Betches · CrimeReads · BookBub “A transporting historical novel, and a smart thriller.”– Washington Post “A luscious setting combined with a sinister, sizzling plot.” -EW A faraway land. A family’s dynasty. A trail of secrets that could shatter their glamorous lifestyle. On a humid afternoon in 1933, American Jessie Lesage … land.
A family’s dynasty.
A trail of secrets that could shatter their glamorous lifestyle.
On a humid afternoon in 1933, American Jessie Lesage steps off a boat from Paris and onto the shores of Vietnam. Accompanying her French husband Victor, an heir to the Michelin rubber fortune, she’s certain that their new life is full of promise, for while the rest of the world is sinking into economic depression, Indochine is gold for the Michelins. Jessie knows that the vast plantations near Saigon are the key to the family’s prosperity, and though they have recently been marred in scandal, she needs them to succeed for her husband’s sake–and to ensure that the life she left behind in America stays buried in the past.
Jessie dives into the glamorous colonial world, where money is king and morals are brushed aside, and meets Marcelle de Fabry, a spellbinding expat with a wealthy Indochinese lover, the silk tycoon Khoi Nguyen. Descending on Jessie’s world like a hurricane, Marcelle proves to be an exuberant guide to colonial life. But hidden beneath her vivacious exterior is a fierce desire to put the colony back in the hands of its people–starting with the Michelin plantations.
It doesn’t take long for the sun-drenched days and champagne-soaked nights to catch up with Jessie. With an increasingly fractured mind, her affection for Indochine falters. And as a fiery political struggle builds around her, Jessie begins to wonder what’s real in a friendship that she suspects may be nothing but a house of cards.
Motivated by love, driven by ambition, and seeking self-preservation at all costs, Jessie and Marcelle each toe the line between friend and foe, ethics and excess. Cast against the stylish backdrop of 1920s Paris and 1930s Indochine, in a time and place defined by contrasts and convictions, Karin Tanabe’s A Hundred Suns is historical fiction at its lush, suspenseful best.
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It is joy to escape into Karin Tanabe’s illuminating new novel, “A Hundred Suns,” a taut psychological thriller set in 1930s Vietnam and interwar Paris. The story follows Jessie Lesage, a woman who’s climbed from rural Virginia into the wealthy Michelin clan, with both promise of a better life for her young family and misgiving. But after her suave husband takes a post at the family’s rubber interests near Saigon amid a political uprising, she begins to question all she’s known. Tanabe slyly inserts readers into a heady time when colonial inequality is boiling over, revolution brews in the tropic air, and somebody has it out for Jessie…. If you’re stuck home wishing you could travel to a fascinating place in an era of intrigue, I know you’ll savor this journey as I did.
A Hundred Suns by Karin Tanabe caught my interest for it’s setting in 1930s Indochine (later, Vietnam) under French colonial rule.
Tanabe’s protagonist Jesse plotted a life to escape the crushing poverty and abuse of her childhood. She achieved an education and became a teacher, then travels to Paris. When she catches a wealthy relation to the Michelin family, she is set up for life. They are in love and have a daughter.
She has kept her past a secret, so when a woman from her previous life shows up in Paris she is desperate to flee and convinces her husband Vincent to request a position overseeing the Michelin Indochine rubber plantations.
Tanabe’s portrait of Indochine’s beauty, tropical climate, and decadent expat society is vivid and beautifully rendered. High society–white and rich only, of course–has a veneer of respectability. The men indulge in sexual freedoms with the local women, the women indulge in leisure and alcohol, and everyone uses cocaine freely.
Vincent’s success depends on keeping production high and expenditures low. He works to improve the quality of life for the local workers–the ‘coolies.’ But overseers deal out cruel punishment to any who try to unionize and fight for humane treatment, the leaders tortured or murdered.
Jesse is taken under wing by the beautiful French woman Marcelle. Marcelle has an agenda. She is a communist and hates colonization and the Michelin family, who were responsible for killing the Indochine man loved by her best friend. Her Indochine lover Khoi is wealthy and gorgeous; by law, they are not allowed to marry. The couple lure Jesse into compromising situations. Marcelle plots to drive Jesse and Victor back to France.
Jesse strives to help her husband in his work, but also experiences strange psychotic episodes and struggles with self-doubt.
I enjoyed reading the novel for it’s setting and the suspense kept me turning pages. As readers come to understand the characters and their motivations deeper, the delineation between good and evil become blurred.
Colonization and unbridled capitalism are shown to be the true evils. The ‘coolies’ are virtual slaves, contracting to work for three years in brutal conditions. When workers strive to organize for better treatment they suffer dire consequences, while the French are given lenient punishments for crimes. A corrupt system corrupts those who participate in the system.
There are scenes of sexual activity and a glimpse into the torture of communist leaders on the plantation, and stories of abuse suffered by Jesse and her siblings.
The novel will appeal to a wide range of readers–historical fiction, women’s fiction, suspense and thrillers, and those who enjoy exotic settings. It is the perfect beach read.
I received a free book from the publisher through Book Club Cook Book. My review is fair and unbiased
Tense, lush, and twisty!
A Hundred Suns is predominantly set in Hanoi during 1933 and is told from two different perspectives. Jesse Lesage, a young mother who becomes overwhelmed and in over her head when she gets swept up in the ex-pat lifestyle while her husband, a member of the renowned Michelin family, is away overseeing his family’s rubber plantations, and Marcelle de Fabry, a charming woman on a ceaseless pursuit for retribution who will do whatever it takes to exact revenge on those she deems responsible.
The prose is clever and rich. The characters are multifaceted, driven, and secretive. And the plot told from alternating perspectives is a mysterious, gripping tale about life, love, friendship, indulgences, political unrest, heartbreak, loss, guilt, grief, vengeance, and deception.
Overall, A Hundred Suns is an intriguing blend of evocative fiction, captivating suspense, and palpable emotion, and as a historical fiction lover, I think what I enjoyed the most was being able to delve into a time and place not typically found in this genre.
This jewel of a novel transported me to another land and a bygone era. I learned about 1930’s French Indochine, but it never felt like a history lesson. Instead, Karin’s beautiful prose lifted me into her characters’ lives. The mystery from Chapter 1 kept me turning pages. She does a great job shining a light on the horrors of the Michelin rubber plantations. Most of all, she delivers a gripping story!
Excellent book about an interesting period in time and the country. Well developed characters. Loved it!
Thank you NetGalley and St. Martins for a complimentary copy. I voluntarily reviewed this book. All opinions expressed are my own.
A Hundred Suns
By: Karin Tanabe
REVIEW
I was a bit disappointed with A Hundred Suns because I was expecting something more from this book. Set in Indiochine in an era I know little about, the story was informative, and I appreciate that. The plot just seemed stuck and not interesting to me because I kept thinking about other things. For whatever reason I made no connection and found this an average read. I can take it or leave it. The story is not my style, but that’s an issue of personal preference. It will appeal to many readers.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book in return for an honest review.
It’s 1933, and Jessie Lesage steps off a boat onto the shores of Indochine. She has come to join her husband, Victor, in his new position as overseer of all the Michelin rubber plantations. He is French, a Michelin on his mother’s side, and wealthy. Wealthy beyond anything Jessie encountered growing up on a poor tobacco farm in Virginia. She soon settles into the glamorous and pampered lifestyle of the ultra-rich.
But quite quickly, we find that Jessie has secrets she needs to keep from Victor, Victor keeps secrets from Jessie, and there are other forces working against them. Who, and why? I felt the plot was good, moving along at a good pace, with a few surprises thrown in. Character development was excellent, as you really felt you knew the main characters. They weren’t necessarily likable, but you understood their motivations. I did find Jessie’s friend, Marcelle, to be a dichotomy. I had a seriously hard time reconciling her actions as displayed to the world with those that she professed in private.
Where the book fell a bit flat for me was the billing of the book as historical fiction. Instead, this was a drama (not quite a thriller) set in the past, which really makes a big difference. Throughout, I really wanted to know more of the country’s history and culture, from foods to beliefs to plantation life and, yes, even opium dens. While a great deal of time was spent on the evils of colonialism, these other subjects were just lightly touched upon or mentioned in passing. If you are looking to be steeped in the time and place of Indochine, you will be disappointed. The book is also chock-full of issues–social, political, familial, racial, economic, mental health–yet none are closely examined . The ending leaves something to be desired as punishment for the wealthy is quite noticeably missing. This is probably factually more true to life than justice always being served, but still.
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I received a complimentary digital copy of this arc book from the publisher and NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review.
In September of 1933, Jessie and Victor Lesage move from France to live in the French Indochina to hopefully win favor with his successful Michelin family. There have been many riots and political upheaval at the rubber plant which is in desperate need of supervision in south Cochinchina.
Jessie was born the oldest of 7 children in a poor farm in Blacksburg, Virginia. Growing up in destitution with minimal parental support, Jessie felt obliged to “parent” her younger siblings. Her desperate situation urges her desire to see the world. She is empowered to attend a small teaching college where she lived in a Manhattan boarding house. Her primary focus was saving enough money to travel to Paris while providing support to her siblings in VA.
The story becomes more complicated as Jessie and Victor along with their young daughter, Lucie, settle into their new home in a new country. Because they are affluent, they are buffered from the atrocious living conditions of the native residents. Many of these local residents work under oppressive circumstances which drives their ambitions to overthrow the leaders with their communist agenda.
Much to Jessie’s awe and comfort, she is befriended immediately by Marcelle de Fabry and her husband Arnaud. Most of the men are busy traveling for work leaving the women to enjoy the luxuries afforded to them. It is during this time that Marcelle seems to quickly engage Jessie into her world of mischief and debauchery. As the story unfolds it draws the reader into the secrets and deceit which both women don’t want revealed.
“Three can keep a secret if two of them are dead.” – Benjamin Franklin
So, the whirl world affairs of the rich and poor are entwined in ways for which the reader could never be prepared. The novel speaks to the political environment as relevant to the extents people will go for redemption and change.
Riveting… Tanabe pulls the reader in from page one, painting a lush, vibrant paradise with a dark side, and taking us along on a fast-paced, exquisitely layered, beautifully detailed ride to the end.
A haunting, evocative tale that left me both richly satisfied and deeply unsettled — yet another Tanabe triumph. Captivating, suspenseful, and full of surprises.
A Hundred Suns is a captivating historical fiction novel with a dash of suspense. It’s set in 1930’s French colonial Indochine. Jessie Lesage travels to Indochine with her husband Victor, a member of the Michelin family, whose task is to improve the management of the rubber plantations after a series of strikes and workers’ deaths. Upon arriving in Indochine, Jessie meets other expatriates and develops a close friendship with an alluring French woman Marcelle. The life of French colonialists is full of opulence, parties, and opium dens, and Jessie embraces it wholeheartedly with the help of Marcelle until she realizes that not everything is perfect in paradise.
The trouble is brewing on Michelin plantations because the workers are not happy with brutal working conditions, and the communists are inciting rebellions. Also, Marcelle might have an ulterior motive in cultivating a friendship with Jessie. But Jessie is determined to make a life for herself and her family in Indochine despite all the complications. A Hundred Suns is a well-written and engrossing book that brings to life the colonialist past with all its issues. I highly recommend this book to historical fiction fans.
Hundred Suns manages the near impossible: it’s both a gripping, relevant page turner, and a searing historical examination — in this case, of the brutal atrocities of colonialism. You’ll read, as I did, to find out who will win the game of cat and mouse, even as you come to understand that in Indochine in the 1930’s — as it is anywhere that one group of people enslaves another–there was no ‘winning.’
A Hundred Suns by Karin Tanabe is an intriguing novel of Indochina and the Michelin (rubber) family. It is written from two points of view: Jessie and Marcelle, and takes place in 1933, at the height of imperialism. Jessie is the wife of Victor Lesage a cousin of the ruling family and anxious to make his way in the world. Jessie had suggested coming to Indochina and it was turning out to be an excellent idea. She had her own reasons, above and beyond it being good for her family: she, Victor and their daughter, Lucie. Marcelle was the wife of Arnaud de Fabry, the head of the chamber of commerce in Hanoi. She was also the lover of long standing of Khoi Nguyen, whom she had met in Paris when he was a student some ten years earlier. She was somewhat discrete but her husband had his own lovers so it was mutual. She and Khoi were looking to get revenge on the man who had killed their friend, Sinh Cao upon his return home several years before. They believed the murder had been at the behest of the Michelin family. Marcelle pretends to be Jessie’s friend. All Jessie wants is to use her brain to help her husband. It gets very complicated. The reader won’t see the end until it smacks them in the face.
This is an extremely well-plotted, well-thought-out story complicated by expectations. People expectations of Jessie as a European wife, Michelin’s expectations of Victor, the servants’ expectations of the family they served and their response to Jessie’s unexpected kindness. There are also secrets, everyone has them and they all come back to bite. It was another time, another world. This book was an exciting glimpse into a totally different lifestyle. It was intriguing as well as frightening. The ease of paying someone to do something for you is probably not much different than today, but it was certainly cheaper. Enjoyable. Interesting. Improbable. I liked it. I recommend it.
I received a free ARC of A Hundred Suns from Netgalley in exchange for a fair and honest review. All opinions and interpretations contained herein are solely my own. #netgalley #ahundredsuns
Vietnam, SE Asia, family-dynamics, friendship, historical-research, historical-novel
The more things change, the more they stay the same. I remembered that maxim countless times as I read this saga. This is the early times of the long French IndoChinese conflicts about colonialism vs communism (think Dr Siri Paiboun) but of the more privileged classes. I had some issues with some of the characters’ portrayals but overall I loved it despite the irregular pacing (it reallly dragged in some places).
I requested and received a free ebook copy from St. Martin’s Press via NetGalley.
Rating: 3.5/5.0
Genre:
Historical
American Jessie Lasage moves to Vietnam, then was a French colony called Indochine, along with her French husband Victor Michelin Lasage and their daughter Lucie. Victor takes his family there due to his new position as the supervisor of the family plantations there.
Jessie meets locals there and also expatriates. She becomes a friend with some of the new persons she meets including Marcelle who like she is another expat wife, but it turns out she is different and has a local boyfriend! Gradually Jessie gets to find out the secrets of people surrounding her, secrets about the plantations and along with that her own secrets also come out.
Though this is considered historical it felt more like a thriller to me. I feel what it could give me as a reader more descriptive views about that era and Vietnam at that time. Several times while I was reading I was imagining it as a modern-day thriller. Yes, there are parts where it talks about the plantations but still, I feel it lacked to create the proper setting to make my mind live that era with the characters.
This was an enjoyable read overall. At times it slowed down for me and other times it was moving a bit faster. There was no consistency with the pace of the story but still, I feel it was a fun book to read. I feel those readers who enjoy historical books with thriller elements would enjoy it most of all, more than the others. I am going with good 3.5 stars out of 5.0
Many thanks to Net Galley and the publishers for providing me a free advanced reading copy in return for this honest and unbiased review.
The book is expected to be released: April 7th, 2020
In this story, which follows Victor Lesage, his wife Jessie, and their daughter Lucie as they embark on their journey from France to one of the French Colonial territories of Indochine, now Vietnam in the 1930’s. Victor has been sent to oversee the the Michelin families rubber plantations as his mother is a Michelin, and he hopes to further his career.
Also living there is Marcelle de Fabry, her husband and her lover Khoi Nguyen.
Marcelle, show Jessie the ins and outs of ex-pat life, which is very different from what she was used to in France.
The story mainly goes between Jessie and Marcelle’s observations as we follow the reasons that they both ended up there, and the relationship they each have formed, and the things they are running from.
From Communist threats, to Opium dens, to a lavish life style, Both Jessie and Marcelle, need to see what woks for them, in a place full of threats and dangers as they navigate things, they think they know.
Suspenseful, full of mystery and misunderstandings.
Well written story.
I would like to thank NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the ARC of this book.
This sensuous, richly textured brings us into the world of 1930’s Indochine, where the expat Europeans have it all and the natives are getting restless. American Jessie Lesage joins her husband Victor, a member of the Michelin family on the Michelin family rubber plantation. Victor has been promoted to managing the property and has things to prove; Jessie spent her early life in dire poverty and will need to learn how to manage in what passes for high society among the expats in Indochine. Both have secrets to hide. Jessie meets Marcella: French, rich, and an advocate (and secret communist) for the indigenous people who work the rubber plantations. Marcella befriends Jessie, and guides her acceptance into local society, but she also has secrets to hide, and she senses that Jessie is not what she appears to be. Conflicts are unavoidable; between the Europeans and the natives they take advantage of at best and often treat abysmally; between Jessie and Marcella who are “frenemies’; and between the competitive rubber barons. While Indochine is beautiful on the surface, things and the people around them are not what they appear to be. When Jessie appears to have a psychotic episode, it seems as if she may have to leave Indochine.
A Hundred Suns will grab your attention and hold it fast, with it’s fascinating blend of fact and fiction. The deceptions run deep and wide, and Karin Tanabe’s description of a life that is beautiful on the surface but rotten to the core will keep you turning pages and giving up sleep until the startling finish.
I found this book good at times and bad at times.
The main character seemed weak and annoying. I didn’t really care too much for the other characters either. The last few chapters were the best. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the early copy
This main character had me wondering about her, liking her, questioning her, hating her, rooting for her, sad for her, loving her, saying no no no to her, and happy for her. How can you love and then hate someone within the covers of a book? You’ll have to read this wonderful historical fiction to find out.
Now this is a story!
One if the best books I’ve read this year.
Written in luminous prose, “A Hundred Suns” is a lush, sweeping and richly evocative tale set against the backdrop of 1930s French Indochina.
Jessie Lesage has fought her way, sometimes deviously, out of her hardscrabble life in rural Virginia.
She made in way to Paris and married into a life of wealth and privilege. Her husband is a member of the Michelin family.
Jessie is keeping some of her dark family history to herself.
When that history threatens to catch up with her in France, she manipulates the situation into getting her husband, Victor, to oversee the Michelin rubber plantations in French Indochina.
But, sometimes, there’s no escaping the past.
This story has it all: secrets, lies, deceit, betrayals, communist uprisings, history and geopolitics of the time and region, atrocities….murder. What’s not to like?
The suspense is palpable.
For any lover of stellar storytelling, do yourself a favor and read this book. NOW!