Book Review: The Moon Opera

What an opera of a book this turns out to be! A modern-day, realistic melodrama about the intersecting lives in the staging of a classic Chinese fantasy, it's the story of a handful of veteran actors with a chance to revive their careers remounting a former triumph, the opera about a girl who accidentally drinks from the elixir of immortality and flies to the moon. For as short as this book is--117 pages, and not long pages, either--it's chock full of dramatic surprises and secret passions, impulsive violence, reversals and revelations in a theatrical, behind-the-scenes rollercoaster ride. The most delightful aspect of this precision miniature is its serpentine narration, the plot slipping and sliding in unexpected directions.

The story begins as the leader of an aging opera troupe encounters a wealthy cigarette factory boss who has fanatically followed the career of the troupe's former ingénue star, Yanqiu, now 40, an ice queen with a very troubled past. The factory boss has seen every production of the Moon Opera with her in it, and he's willing to put up the money for one more. Like a string of Chinese firecrackers, this sets off a chain of emotional situations, jealousies, sexual encounters, bargains and betrayals--not to mention some pretty harrowing dieting.

The situation is aggravated by Chunlai, Yanqiu's breathtakingly lovely, prodigiously talented student, who is as close to Yanqiu as a daughter. Chunlai is the understudy but should be playing the leading role instead of her teacher.

With frequent one-liners dispensing a pithy, pragmatic wisdom toward the story's sordid situations--"But sex is so toxic it doesn't let you quit just because you want to"--this elegant eight-chapter novella is a highly cinematic backstage drama from one of the co-writers of the movie Shanghai Triad; it's a wise, gaudy little tragedy attractively packaged by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt with a cover featuring a Peking Opera face in full make-up. The never-predictable plot is tightly wound, clever and sinuous, building right up to the carefully orchestrated climactic opening night of the Moon Opera. It's pure soap opera transformed into art, but once the plot has you in its grips, you won't be getting out of your armchair until you've lingered over the last sentence.--Nick DiMartino

Shelf Talker: A modern-day, realistic melodrama about the intersecting lives in the staging of a classic Chinese opera, with a plot slipping and sliding in unexpected directions.