Series: Standalone
Release Date: June 4, 2019
It begins with a mystery. Sylvie, the beautiful, brilliant, successful older daughter of the Lee family, flies to the Netherlands for one final visit with her dying grandmother—and then vanishes.
Amy, the sheltered baby of the Lee family, is too young to remember a time when her parents were newly immigrated and too poor to keep Sylvie. Seven years older, Sylvie was raised by a distant relative in a faraway, foreign place, and didn’t rejoin her family in America until age nine. Timid and shy, Amy has always looked up to her sister, the fierce and fearless protector who showered her with unconditional love.
But what happened to Sylvie? Amy and her parents are distraught and desperate for answers. Sylvie has always looked out for them. Now, it’s Amy’s turn to help. Terrified yet determined, Amy retraces her sister’s movements, flying to the last place Sylvie was seen. But instead of simple answers, she discovers something much more valuable: the truth. Sylvie, the golden girl, kept painful secrets . . . secrets that will reveal more about Amy’s complicated family—and herself—than she ever could have imagined.
A deeply moving story of family, secrets, identity, and longing, Searching for Sylvie Lee is both a gripping page-turner and a sensitive portrait of an immigrant family. It is a profound exploration of the many ways culture and language can divide us and the impossibility of ever truly knowing someone—especially those we love.
• Statutory r@pe
• Discussion of suicide
• Emotional and physical abuse
• Infidelity
• Missing person (the resulting grief that goes with that)
• See Ending for HEA status.
• See Possible Triggers for Abuse and OTT sad parts.
Format: Hardcover
Rating: 4.75/5 stars
Searching for Sylvie Lee was a riveting novel about the secrets kept from family. It was so much more suspenseful than I thought it’d be, which honestly shouldn’t have surprised me, given that the story is a mystery! I distinctly remember finishing parts of Searching for Sylvie Lee (there are 5 parts) exclaiming (aloud), no way!
While Searching for Sylvie Lee is a suspenseful mystery (where is Sylvie?), the author, Jean, brings up so many important topics. The novel navigates the tribulations of immigrating from China to the USA and the resulting language barriers and systemic racism the characters face. I found the shifting perspectives of Searching for Sylvie Lee so impactful because it gave the reader first-person accounts of being an immigrant and the daughter of immigrant parents.
To illustrate, Ma doesn’t speak English that well which is conveyed in her perspective. Ma also reflects on how her lack of English knowledge impacted her ability to get a job when she and her husband, Pa, first moved to the USA. The lack of economic stability is one reason Ma and Pa decided to give their first daughter, Sally (renamed Sylvie in the Netherlands), to her mother and family-friend to raise.
Secrets Inherited from Mother to Daughter
Searching for Sylvie Lee is premised by the disappearance of Sylvie after she goes back to her childhood home in the Netherlands to say goodbye to her dying grandmother. It’s the first time Sylvie had gone back since leaving when she was nine years old… more than 20 years ago.
A significant portion of Sylvie’s characterization, and her relationship with her mother, is built on those first nine years Sylvie spent in the Netherlands. Sylvie is thought to be the perfect daughter–both pretty and smart. However, Sylvie’s lack of belonging in her childhood–her parental abandonment and treatment as a second-class citizen from her guardians–resulted in a drive to succeed and prove her self-worth.
Sylvie’s narrative illustrates the trauma and difficulties of reconciling her hurt now that she’s an adult. However, adulthood offers Sylvie a unique perspective to look back and understand the revolving relationships of her two families. Like the relationship between her mother and her guardian, Helena. There are many secrets–some obvious and others naught–that seem to be pulsing beneath the polite-surface. The multitude of secrets revealed throughout Searching for Sylvie Lee illustrates how families sometimes function on not acknowledging the obvious despite the trauma and heartbreak they yield.
Bonds of Sisterhood
Searching for Sylvie Lee is a plot-driven novel; however, the book also takes Amy on a journey of re-discovery her sister and slowly realizing that the Sylvie she knew was tempered by Sylvie’s desire to appear perfectly successful. The relationship between Amy and Sylvie (and with their mother) is a testament to how much is left unsaid in a relationship, despite being close.
Searching for Sylvie Lee is told from the perspectives of Sylvie, Amy and Ma. However, while Amy and Ma narrate the present, Sylvie’s perspective details the events that led up to her disappearance. Therefore, the reader can understand the relationships between Sylvie and Amy, Amy and Ma and Sylvie and Ma from every perspective.
The narration was excellent; the individuality of each character was perfectly captured. I especially appreciated how aware each character was about their relationship with the other narrators. Sylvie admits to how she’s prone to uplifting and undermining her sister in the same sentence–she loves her sister but doesn’t want to lose her sister’s hero-worship.
Also, while the plot itself is a mystery, I find that the relationship between Amy and Sylvie with the supporting characters (Sylvie’s friends and guardians) were also shrouded in mystery. I admit it got a bit annoying how none of the characters would be forthright unless asked a very specific question. But, it made the reveal at the end so much better.
Atmospheric Setting
Jean Kwok has a fantastic talent for bringing her scenery to life. The details used to describe the Netherlands made me feel that I had personally vacationed in both places. I particularly loved how the characteristics of the Netherlands tied into the family histories of Sylvie–for a girl who has been prophesied to die by water, it’s ill-fated that the small town in the Netherlands is surrounded by water.
I also appreciated how part of the story was dedicated to confronting and discussing the subtle and blatant racism that Sylvie and her family have faced. The primary location in Searching for Sylvie Lee was a small-town outside of Holland… which resulted in noticeably less ‘tolerant’ neighbours. The novel touches upon the harmful and ignorant tendency of white people to amalgamate different ethnicities into one racial stereotype, which is emphasized by Helena’s remark:
“We need to serve every type of Asian cuisine here. The Dutch cannot tell us apart, so when they come to a Chinese restaurant, they expect Indonesia and Japanese food too.”
Helena in Searching for Sylvie Lee
In Conclusion
It’s so important to read diverse books, especially ones written by authors who have experienced what they are writing, because they centre the stories of diverse people in a world that promotes whiteness and heteronormative values as the norm.
Jean Kwok immigrated from Hong Kong to the USA and can speak to the balancing act of assimilation and holding onto one’s cultures and traditions. Jean also currently lives in the Netherlands and can comment on the racism within Holland (and its outlying towns). The discussion of the discrimination experienced by Sylvie, Amy and Lukas throughout Searching for Sylvie Lee is essential as it disrupts the discriminatory behaviour and stereotypes history has excused and endorsed (white supremacy).
So, why not 5-stars? The ending!
Now, compared to many Goodreads reviews, I actually thought the ending made sense, despite not having even entertained that ending. However, my issue (and reason for the lack of 5-stars) is that there was one secret left unexposed, which I couldn’t stand.
Once Amy does find Sylvie, I felt SO bad for Lukas (Sylvie’s childhood playmate and best friend; his parents were Sylvie’s guardians in Holland). The whole discussion about people having a singular love that’s their ‘French Revolution’ (there is a *before* Sylvie and an *after* Sylvie, but there is no moving on from Sylvie) really drove home just how much Lukas loved her. So, the heartbreak! Ugh, so freaking sad.
Overall, I highly recommend Searching for Sylvie Lee if you want an atmospheric mystery that beautifully navigates the relationship between a mother and her daughter as it unpacks the secrets that threaten to tear them apart.
Buy Searching for Sylvie Lee
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