I bought this book for the virtual Asian book box -

A Chinese girl adrift in London. An English man adrift in life. A whole dictionary of possible misunderstandings...

The novel is written in (deliberately bad) English. It is a romantic comedy about two lovers who don't speak each other's language. The heroine is a Chinese girl who has been sent to London to study by her parents. She calls herself Z because English people can't pronounce her name, but when she arrives in Heathrow she's no better at their language. Set loose to find her way through a confusion of youth hostels, Full English breakfasts and a lack of the London fog, she winds up lodging with a Chinese family in Tottenham, and thinking she might as well not have left home. But then she meets a man who changes everything. From the moment he smiles at her, she enters a new world of sex, freedom and self-discovery. But she also realises that in the west, 'Love' does not always mean the same as in China, and you can learn all the words in the English language and still not understand your man.

This book made me laugh so much, it is very funny in places. It is also quite frank/explicit at times. Despite the deliberately bad English - it is very well written. The book also reminded me of an asian friend of mine who always mixes up her gender definitions, men are always 'she or her' and women are 'he or him'.

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

sent on as part of the contemporary Asian VBB. I hope you like it.

Thanks for adding this to the VBB, Dancesports, and for sending it to me.
I heard about this book, great to have it here now.

A quick and easy read, often rather tragicomic. Sometimes I found the protagonist's ignorance and resistence to any kind of intercultural skills a bit irritating, but I suppose that's what makes the book work and that's why it's often quite funny. A very nice novel about culture shock, with a lot of interesting observations.
Reserved for an East Asian VBB.

Annimanni chose this from the East Asian VBB.
Travelling to Finland now.
Happy reading!

Received with thanks :) Can't wait to start reading this, looks very tempting. And thank you for the labels too, ApoloniaX!