The Gift of Rain by Tan Twan Eng

A few months ago I read the most recent novel by Tan Twan Eng, The House of Doors, liked it enough that I decided it was time to read his earlier novels, beginning with The Gift of Rain. Published in 2008 it was nominated for the Man Booker Prize that year.

The story begins in 1939, in Penang, where we meet Philip Hutton. Philip is the 16-year-old son of Noel Hutton and his second wife, Khoo Yu Lian, a Chinese woman. Philip has two older brothers, and a sister from his father’s first marriage to a British woman. As a mixed-race child, Philip felt he was “a child born between two worlds, belonging to neither”.

We meet Philip when he is a much older man, when a Japanese woman, Michiko Murakami, arrives at his door. She was once a friend to Hayato Endo, as was Philip “before the war wrecked everything”. Philip still lives in the home where he was born, Istana, where on the day he “was born my father planted a casuarina tree”.

Visible from Istana is a small island. Early in 1939 Noel Hutton leased the island to Hayato Endo, who became teacher in aikijutsu, and mentor to Philip.

Michiko has come to Philip asking about the years Philip shared with a man she once loved. Reluctant, at first, to speak to her, Philip comes to trust her, and finds comfort in sharing his story. A story that takes us from the Japanese incursion into China, and into the Second World War. The British in Penang refused to believe that Japan would have any interest in their small island.

The Japanese landed on the Malayan Peninsula in early December, 1941, a day before the attack on Pearl Harbour. Many residents of Penang left for Singapore believing they would be safe there. Noel Hutton refused to leave Penang, and the business his great-grandfather founded.

Many readers will know about the history of this time, and the cruelty of the Japanese. What many will not know about is the culture of the Chinese and the Japanese, the way of life at this time in this place. The discipline of what is taught to Philip by Endo-san. A practice that influenced their actions during the war.

The story is told in the first person, almost all of it taking place in the past, with a few chapters returning to the present time as Philip and Michiko come closer to the end of their stories. I found this a novel to be of interesting history, of a time before, during and after the Second World War in Malaysia. It is beautifully written and composed. And, it is a book that will leave you thinking. How far would you go to protect your family, yourself and those you love?

Toward the end of the novel, we see two old people sitting on a bench. Two old people who hold memory. A time that will be gone when it is no longer held in living memory, when their lives come to an end.