Customer Reviews

When the Elephants Dance: A Novel

5 star:		(38)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a first novel by Tess Uriza Holthe, a young Filipino-American woman and what an amazing debut it is! It's based on her father's experiences in the Philippines during World War 2 and it describes the devastating effect it had on the people. The title comes from the saying "when the elephants dance, the chickens must be careful", and it alludes to the Japanese and Americans as the powerful elephants and the Filipino people as the chickens who must scurry about and try not to get trampled.

The storyline follows some Filipino neighbors who hide in a basement during the final days of the war, venturing out only to find food. These trips are dangerous and capture means torture or death, but still they venture out. There's a 12-year-old boy, his 17-year-old sister as well as a young man who has chosen to be a guerilla. We get to know each of them well, as well as their families and identify with their fear, hunger and courage. But Ms. Holthe has added a second element to the story. While they are trapped in that basement, and later when they are prisoners in Manila, the elders tell stories laced with magic realism, which not only keeps their minds off the war around them, but also introduces the reader to some of the history, myths and legends of the people. This structure added depth and texture as the life lessons they taught affected the hard choices made by the characters.

I loved the voice, the tone, the interweaving of past and present. And I loved learning about the Philippine culture. I could almost taste the food, smell the ripe foliage, feel the heat. I learned about the hard years of Spanish rule, the role of the church, and the poverty of the lower classes. There are lessons in everyday living. And some moving love stories. This book has everything. The author, however, has been criticized for getting distances between places confused and for misspelling Tagalog words. As an American, however, I was not aware of these small details. I was totally caught up in the story and found myself thinking about the characters long after I put the book down for the day. This is a simply wonderful book and I highly recommend it.

This wonderful book is a treat for readers everywhere! Beautifully written (many of the passages absolutely sing), it's reminiscent of the classics--from 100 Years of Solitude, the Canterbury Tales and the Decameron.

In the wartime Philipines, several families gather in a cellar to hide from the Japanese soldiers who terrorize the Filipino population. To pass the time and quell the pains of hunger, they tell each other stories, which are without a doubt the best part of the novel. Rich with Filipino myth and magical realism, each story reveals something not only about the characters, but about this long-ignored but proud Pacific culture. The story of war, which plays out simultaneously, is less captivating, but that's only because of the superb quality of the stories, which would be hard for any writer to top. Still, the story of these people, caught between the Japanese and the Americans, illuminates a part of the war that many of us have never really learned about.

This is a triumphant, beautifully written book, which stayed with me a long time after I finished it. Very highly recommended.

I kept hearing that this book was a blend of magical realism and painful reality. It is...I guess. It's a story of the last days of WWII in the Philippine Islands, during the Japanese occupation. The present-time narrative alternates between the points of view of three young people, and now and then it shifts to a story of the past, told by one of the older people, that tends to contain elements of the magical or supernatural, and is intended to convey a lesson for the young people in the present. This plot style has the potential to disintegrate into chaos, by Holthe skillfully keeps it moving with gorgeous prose and seemless blending of past and present tales. Her portrait of a nation caught between the hammer and anvil of two powerful opposing armies, of a people struggling to salvage identity and honor from the blood and ashes of war, is beautifully written and heartbreaking. This is REAL literature.

Marvelous! Can't wait for her next work...

For a first novel, Ms. Holthe's "When the Elephants Dance" is a marvelous piece of work. I did get a bit irritated by the misspelled and mis-phrased Tagalog words and statements, some details on fauna, and also the lapses in time judgment (crossing over to Coron, Palawan and back to Manila in less than a day). For that, I fault the editors. Nonetheless, I consider those trivial in the face of great storylines and lyric and magical narratives of the allegorical stories. I grew intimate with each of the narrators and the stories they both told and heard.
I wish the novel never ended. When I finished the book, I felt that that world was gone and I had to say goodbye to my new friends and lovers.

I hope Ms. Holthe continues to write and I eagerly await her second opus. I think her first novel is just heralding whatever comes next.

She's got a remarkable voice, and with "When the Elephants Dance," Tess Uriza Holthe is just clearing her throat.

The concept of this novel intrigued me, I love different cultures and stories about the people and their myths and legends, so I was excited to start this book, I was in no way prepared to get so involved, so fast, (from the first page), with the characters and the overall story of the Japanese invasion of the Phillipines during WW II. It is amazing to me what strength the human spirit has to endure so much hardship and heartache.

The basic story is told from three different points of view; that of Alejandro, the oldest brother of a family hiding in their basement during the Japanese occupation, with neighbors and friends, Isabelle, the oldest daughter, and Domingo Matapang, a guerilla fighter trying to save his country and family. Intermingled are stories from some of the most wonderfully entertaining group of people sharing the cellar with Alejandro and Isabelle's family.

What these main characters had to go through will tear your heart out; some of the stories will gladden you and make you smile, all will tug at your heart strings.

I couldn't put this book down! I was totally involved with what was happening in the Phillipines, what was happening to the characters, how they were going to come through such horrendous conditions and treatment, and through it all the history and legends of the people of the Phillipines was amazing. What a wonderful tribute to the strength and heart of an amazing culture.

I can't reccomend this book strong enough, I loved it!!!

Enjoy, Debbi

People who know me know that I read a great deal --and try to read good, worthwhile thought provoking books that take me to places I haven't been or periods I am unfamiliar with,,,and that I love to recommend books that I have been impressed with --well, When The Elephants Dance fits all of the above -- it is compelling, highly thought provoking and is just so well written....that you can literally feel and taste and experience the hardships that the Filipinos endured during the Japanese occupation...the mythical and magical stories told by the members of the extended family thrown together in an attempt at survival are breathtaking and I felt emotions that I don't ordinarily experience with a book, any book..it is simply put a wonderful story that should be read by many.

I'm an insatiable fan of Asian American literature, and while I could empathize with Chinese American, Korean American, and Japanese American authored-books, there was never a book that I could TRULY relate to. Yes, there were Jessica Hagedorns and Bino A. Realuyos, but I could never relate to them the way I can relate to Mrs. Holthe's style of storytelling. For the first time, a book by a Filipino American like myself has been written about a time in history that I've often longed to know more about. Her style of telling this story is so genuine - it gives you a sense of the way of thinking of Filipinos, of their sense of pride. She doesn't omit the Tagalog or the Spanish, and she translates each phrase to include non-Filipinos, non-Tagalog speaking and non-Spanish speaking readers. As a journalist, I know much about the political and American angle of World War II, but you will never read about what the people of the Philippines went through during that time. I can't stress enough how long I've been waiting for a novel like this. Thank you Mrs. Holthe!

I found this book difficult to read because of the historical accuracy of the story. The writing was incredibly vivid, often causing the disturbing images to literally come to life and spring off the pages. None the less, the writing's intense and accurate retelling of the Japanese occupation of the Philippines in World War II, was well served by this vivid and detailed style of writing. Within the book are woven first person narratives from different characters - each telling the current circumstances of war through their own eyes, and giving a bit of their personal history as well. Uriza Holthe imbues this personal history with realism, retelling actual Filipino folk tales and archetypal lore. The books ending is tragic but realistic and expected; the author braces the reader, throughout the book, to take the difficult and non-storybook ending. 'When Elephants Dance' is a worthwhile and ultimately, satisfying book.

I am not bothered by the misspelled Tagalog phrases, and there are quite a few. Nor by the fact that Domingo Matapang's dog is named Pogi in World War II, when the word, a streetslang derivative of guwapo, which means handsome, came into use only in the 60's. I wouldn't call the melodrama melodramatic either; I'd call it simply being Filipino.

I enjoyed the book, but would have preferred the stories within the main narrative told in a manner matching the escalation of war. The stories, while supposed to have been told by different people, sounded like they were coming from one source and all too uniform in style.

I'm proud to be Filipino, am astounded by the recent emergence of Filipino-American literature in writers like Brian Ascalon Rowley (American Son), Peter Bacho (Cebu), Bino Realuyo (Umbrella Country), but I can't quite say this is magic realism along the lines of Gabriel Garcia Marquez (A Hundred Years of Solitude) and Louis de Bernieres (The Troublesome Offspring of Cardinal Guzman). Just the same, kudos to Tess Uriza Holthe. I hope she keeps on writing.

Found out about this book because of the writer who is from San Francisco and did a book signing at one of the local bookstores. The book is a story about the last days of the Japanese occupation of the Philippines during World War 2. In it there are tales of the people in the culture that cover the span of three generations including the days of Spanish colonization. These stories are nice stories about the complex relationships of people that bear a burden of one sort of another. The stories range from tales of forbidden love, to unwarranted jealousy, to the anguish of letting go of a loved one. Her narrative style of writing in the first person brings alive the thoughts of the main character's thoughts and personality as they try to make sense of the world around them. The war serves as a backdrop of the book in a sense but yet serves as a good platform of bringing these diverse stories together. Holthe has a good sense of transitioning between stories to make the overall plot of the book stay together. She introduces the character in the background and slowly brings in the character. At first you'll think that the person is, for example, a old tight-fisted woman who wouldn't give a penny to a leper. But as she tells her story you are introduced to their life in vibrant detail and feel what's burning in her soul. When the reader is brought back into the main storyline you get a new perspective of the old woman and the story makes the reader more humble.
This book all in all is a great read for those who like folk tales. Perhaps some day there will be a movie in the works for this book.