A FREE LIFE

Jason Ma brings a wonderfully enriching technique to his narration of Jin's engrossing novel about a Chinese immigrant family's adaptation to America in the late twentieth century. Ma's voicings of the couple, Nan and Pinping, as they speak English, become a metaphor for the experience of immigration--full of all the tentativeness, uncertainty, and lack of confidence that is the lot of all who labor through an alien culture. Gradually, as the Wus become more--but not fully--Americanized, Ma subtly accords them greater facility and assuredness. He proves himself a sensitive guide through a novel that addresses fascinating topics of identification--such a loyalty to country versus government and the existential role of an artist who has been rooted out of his native culture. M.O. © AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine [Published: MAY 2008]