Here be tigers

With a lot of hype surrounding this novel, it was going to be very hard to live up to my expectations. As I have read many books that have created a lot of hype upon there release, but I have eventually been disappointed. I believe a book can be ‘overhyped’, which is not a good thing. I would rather read a book that I know very little about, than one which is being constantly praised. As then my expectations are far too high for the novel to ever succeed. I am surprised and pleased to say ‘The Tigers Wife’ exceeded all my expectations; this unconventional novel is deserving of all the hype it is getting.

 With this being Téa Obreht’s first novel, she brings a fresh and original look on what could be a simple story. Aswell as having the main story of Natalia, who is trying to discover the truth about her grandfathers death and travelling as a doctor to help destroyed orphanages. Obreht also intertwines myths into a modern day setting. There are two myths that take up a large chunk of the story; one is to do with the ‘deathless man’, who her grandfather has encountered throughout his life. The ‘deathless man’ can see other people’s deaths but cannot die himself, this is who Natalia believes her grandfather was trying to find before his own death. The second myth is about a tiger that escaped from captivity in World War two and ended up living in her grandfather’s town when he was a boy. The tiger developed an unusual relationship with a death-mute woman, which lead the woman to become known as ‘the tigers wife’. People who love magic and fantasy stories should thoroughly enjoy this book, as the two myths take up more of the story than I was expecting. However Obreht does seem to carry these stories for far too long at points, and they do not help the story move on. Nevertheless this can be overlooked due to the quality of the visionary and innovative writing Obreht uses to tell her story.

  

In my opinion, the relationship between Natalia and her grandfather is the most interesting and important part of the story. When writing about their relationship, Obreht describes it exquisitely. Its what the reader can relate to the most, which makes me wish that she would have concentrated more on this rather than going into far too much detail about the two myths. Its obvious that Obreht wanted her debut novel to be original and different from others, which is why she defiantly deserved the Orange Prize for Fiction. ‘The Tigers Wife’ may not be to everyone’s taste, but one cannot deny that Téa Obreht is one of most brilliant and fascinating young writers that there is today.