Butterfly's Child: A Novel [Paperback]

Angela Davis-Gardner (Author)

Book Description

Release date: April 10, 2012

When three-year-old Benji is plucked from the security of his home in Nagasaki to live with his American father, Lt. Benjamin Franklin Pinkerton, and stepmother, Kate, on their farm in Illinois, the family conceals Benji’s true identity as a child born from a liaison between an officer and a geisha—and instead tells everyone that he is an orphan. When the truth surfaces, it will splinter this family’s fragile dynamic and send Benji on the journey of a lifetime from Illinois to the Japanese settlements in Denver and San Francisco, then across the ocean to Nagasaki, where he will uncover the truth about his mother’s tragic death.

Don’t miss the exclusive conversation between Angela Davis-Gardner and Jennifer Egan at the back of the book.

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

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Guest Reviewer: Jennifer Egan on Angela Davis-Gardner's Butterfly's Child
Jennifer Egan is the author of the novels Look At Me, The Keep, The Invisible Circus, and the short story collection Emerald City. Her fourth novel, A Visit From The Goon Squad, won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

I began reading Angela Davis-Gardner’s novel Butterfly’s Child in August 2010, on a family trip to Ireland. My expectation, honestly, was that I would dip in for a few pages and move on. I was comically wrong. In fact, I got swept up by Davis-Gardner’s tale to a point that proved disruptive to our trip: I found myself exhausted from staying up late to read it, trying to duck out of our sightseeing activities and continue. As my husband finally put it, “I feel like there is another person on this vacation.”

All the while, I asked myself: what makes this book so good? The first answer is evident from the very fact that I couldn’t put it down: the story hugely compelling. “Butterfly” refers to Puccini’s Madam Butterfly, whose mixed-race son Davis-Gardner follows back to America with his father, Pinkerton, and his American wife, after Butterfly’s suicide. Davis-Gardner’s historical research is effortlessly authoritative; her exploration of race in late 19th Century America is fascinating. But Butterfly’s Child is as much a study of gender as of race, and its portrait of the impact of Midwestern farm and family life on Kate, Pinkerton’s wife, is unforgettably poignant.

Best of all, Davis-Gardner unleashes a walloping surprise in the second half of Butterfly’s Child, upending the reader’s assumption that her novel is a mere re-imagining of Butterfly’s familiar tale, and revealing her deeper strategy: to coolly unmask the distortions inherent in dramatic mythmaking.

As a member of a book group, I can’t think of a better choice than Butterfly’s Child: compelling as catnip; bristling with ideas and questions and discussion points. It will fascinate and entertain its readers, and it will make some of them angry. In other words, it’s an excellent book.

From Publishers Weekly

Immediately engaging, this quiet and measured sequel to Puccini's Madame Butterfly begins with the dramatic détente of Puccini's opera: Cio-Cio-san (Butterfly) kills herself when Pinkerton, the father of her son, Benji, returns with an American wife after four years away. Benji then travels with his father and stepmother to flat central Illinois, the polar opposite of Japan, to begin a life of hard farm labor, becoming an outsider within his family and community. Though Davis-Garner (Plum Wine) inherited her characters, they are complex, dimensional beings in her hands. There are no stock villains, perfect heroes, or tragic victims; as Benji grows up and we follow his journey in search of the family, descended from samurai, that supposedly awaits his return to Japan, the author traces the sad descent of Benji's stepmother into madness and father into alcoholism, without being trite or moralistic. Though some of the tension drains from the plot in the book's middle, Davis-Gardner reaps most of the dramatic benefits of Puccini's plot while simultaneously creating an unrushed meditation on character. (Apr.)
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Dial Press Trade Paperback; Reprint edition (April 10, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385340958
• ISBN-13: 978-0385340953
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.9 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (27 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #438,000 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A literary equivalent to the exquisite opera April 3, 2011

By Laura Shaine Cunningham

Format:Hardcover

I have just finished this fine novel and can't wait to sing its praises. The prose is the literary equivalent of Puccini's opera. Passion is underscored by sadness. I am so drawn in from page 1 to the fate of the little half-Japanese boy, raised in the marriage that caused his mother to kill herself. Could there be a more tragic legacy? Transplanted to America, Butterfly's half-orphaned son must live in the shadow of his mother's suicide and his father's faithlessness and be raised by the woman whose very existence destroyed his fragile, beautiful mother. The little boy embodies the contradictions of two cultures and divergent parents. As sensual and moody as its subject, the novel held me in its spell and I was hesitant to re-enter the "real" world. I think Puccini would have approved. It is rare to read a novel inspired by an immortal opera and this spare yet elegant work accomplishes what could be impossible. This book would also make a fine film as I could visualize every scene.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Masterpiece April 1, 2011

By Edward McCann

Format:Hardcover

Angela Davis-Gardner's story of what happens after the last aria of Madame Butterfly is poignant and beautifully crafted. As a reader, I felt I'd traveled through time to meet and observe these characters whom Puccini named and compelled to sing, but whom Davis-Gardner brings to life in ways that surprise and satisfy.

Of all the assessments I've read to date, I think the writer for Kirkus Reviews said it best: "In its way, (Butterfly's Child) holds its own alongside the modern Western masterpieces of Larry McMurtry and Cormac McCarthy. For all its melancholy and madness, it strikes themes of hope and renewal, and believing in the unbelievable."

This is Davis-Gardner's best work ever. I recommend this remarkable book without hesitation, and look forward to sharing copies - and the pleasure of this experience -- with my friends.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars A good read.... but only if you don't love the opera July 7, 2011

By M. Wolansky

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

I enjoyed reading the book. I thought it was well written and well researched. Obviously the author knows quite a bit about Japan and Japanese culture. I disliked the twist at the end of the book. It makes a mockery of the opera. I agree with the other reviewer regarding Tosca, and have to say "no, no, you've ruined it." I love opera and begin crying during the duet at the end of the 1st Act of Madame Butterfly. I hope I can overlook the novel and enjoy the opera again.