A Wife in Bangkok

When Crystal’s husband, Brian, suddenly announces that his company is sending him to manage its Bangkok office and that he expects her and their children to come along, she reluctantly acquiesces. She doesn’t want to leave the job she loves and everything familiar in their small Oklahoma town; it’s 1975, however, and Crystal, a woman with traditional values, feels she has to be a good wife and follow her husband.

Crystal finds beauty in Thailand, but also isolation and betrayal. Fighting intense loneliness and buffeted by a series frightening and shocking events, she struggles to adapt to a very different culture and battle a severe depression―and, ultimately, decide whether her broken relationship with her husband is worth saving.

My Review

Author, Iris Mitlin Lav is a good story teller. I was transported to Bangkok. When it came to Crystal, she tugged at my emotions. She is the glue that kept the family together. Thus everything she was feeling and going through, I really felt for her. 

This book is a character driven one. Everyone who showed up in this book had a part in the story big or small. When it came to Brian, I had mixed emotions about it. On one hand I was angry at him for not being as invested in his family and dragging them all across the world without asking them. Yet, on the other hand, I could not fully be angry at him due to the fact that he did acknowledge his faults. He did step up when it counted. 

While, I did like this book, I found it moved at a slow pace. I was invested in this book but maybe not as much as I wanted the full time due to the slow pacing. Overall, I did enjoy this book and would read another one by this author.  `