First read of the new year! And it was oh so lovely. Bodies in Motion is a multi-generational novel told through short stories - or perhaps I should call it a collection of short stories woven into a novel. Each chapter focuses on a different member of one of two interconnected Sri Lankan/Sri Lankan American families. Most of the stories deal in love - marital love and forbidden love and familial love; loves that grow over time or that curdle over decades. And balanced alongside love is the tension between the needs and expectations of family and of one's own self. That tension is most acutely experienced by the women, but it touches everyone.

As each chapter unfolds, the perspective of the point of view character sheds more light back on earlier pieces of the greater story. This is definitely a book that will benefit from re-reading - but each story still feels complete unto itself, often featuring a sucker-punch to the emotions.

Absolutely recommended. ( )

I cannot speak for how accurately this book depicts Sri Lankan culture, but I can say that I could barely put it down. The book is a series of vignettes from a couple of Tamil families. It depicts the relationships between parents and children, aunts and nieces, and romantic and sexual partners. There is a lot of concern with how women support each other and make compromises to sustain both their own sexuality and their traditional culture. You might consider this somewhere between "chick lit" and "literary fiction."

A number of the vignettes have sexual content, but nothing prolonged; it's a passionate book, perhaps even an arousing book in places, but not a masturbatory book. Mohanraj also writes about food, clothing, weather, all of the things of daily life, in dense but brief detail. One gets the impression of a lush, damp mind, full of biodiversity.

Highly recommended. Some sexually explicit parts. ( )

4034 Bodies in Motion Stories by Mary Anne Mohanraj (read 5 June 2005) The author of this book of short stories was born in Sri Lanka, and the book tells of various related Sri Lankan people, both there and in the US over the years from 1939 to 2002. There is much talk of rebels against Sri Lankan traditional ways, lots of unnecessary explicit sex, some weird and icky to read about. The prose is spare and polished and various accounts have some interest, though the intricate discussion of Sri Lankan food and cooking was a bore. Much modern fiction is seldom fun to read, and this book fits in that category. ( )