Written in Black by K.H. Lim

Borneo Island, Brunei

I will admit, I mostly read this book to check off Brunei (which is the opposite of what my Reading My Way Around the World adventure is supposed to to), and this book accomplished little else than helping me check off a box.

The story is narrated by 10 year old, wealthy (why is every book I've read recently about a wealthy family?), Chinese-Brunei boy named Jonathan. School is boring. His brothers and cousins are mean to him. His grandfather just died, and his mother left about 6 months ago. The short novel takes place mostly over the 3 days of his grandfather's funeral process. Jonathan sneaks away to try to track down his brother (who would help him get in touch with their mother), but ends up on a horrible adventure getting into a surprising amount of danger for a few hours. It is *somewhat* comical and you do learn a little bit about the country and Chinese customs, but mostly it is strange and wordy (especially for being such a short novel). There's no character development at all.

I hated the narration in this book. It is written so childishly. The book I read immediately before this one, The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy, did such a beautiful job of capturing the children's points of view without becoming childish. This book was silly, but not in an entertaining way. I've never read Diary of a Wimpy Kid, but this book reminds me of what it would be like to read one of those books as an adult (although I'm sure that series must have some heartwarming moments and/or redeeming characters - which Written in Black did not). I looked up the author because I thought this story might have been written by an actual child, but K.H. Lim is very much an adult. He's a doctor, actually, who writes in his spare time.

Unless you are specifically trying to read a book from every country of the world or a specific region, I would skip this one.

Review by the Numbers:

Overall: 2/5

Writing: 2/5

Plot: 2/5

Character Development: 1/5

Message: 2/5

- Brunei (Reading My Way Around the World Challenge)

- A Book About Asian/Middle Eastern Experiences (My Diversity Challenge)

- East Asian/Southeast Asian/Pacific Islander Author (Celebrity Readers 2021 Diversity Reading Challenge)

- A Book that has Fewer than 1,000 Reviews on Goodreads (2021 PopSugar Reading Challenge)