Literary Analysis: Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet as a Historical Fiction
In Jamie Ford’s historical fiction Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, this split narrative focuses on two eras: 1942 and 1986. Within these era’s, Ford’s novel focuses on a Chinese boy, Henry Lee, and what it was like to grow up in the international district with prejudice everywhere, especially in his own family being a first generation American. His novel tells the story of Henry, as well as a Japanese girl by the name of Keiko. The novel tells the story of these two young friends and the hardships faced when the government sends Keiko and her family away to the Japanese internment camps in the Northwest in the 1940’s. His novel displays the effects
Ford doesn’t accommodate to readers by making the book non-offensive or politically correct. Ford makes the book historically correct as possible.
Thirdly, by MacLeod’s criteria, Ford’s novel is a “good” historical fiction by not “set[ing] aside the social mores of the past as though they were minor afflictions, small obstacles, easy—and painless—for an independent mind to overcome”. This is displayed near the beginning of the book after Chaz, the bully, snatches Henry’s “I am Chinese” pin off of his shirt. While walking away Keiko tries to grab Henry’s hand for comfort, but he pushes it away thinking, “My father would fall over dead… And in town, someone would see us” (23). Ford made the transition of Henry opening up to Keiko take time; they didn’t become immediate friends. Ford makes sure to make the relationship between Keiko and Henry plausible. They both are ‘scholarshipping’ at an all-white school and met working in the school kitchen, as payment for scholarshipping. Their connection is somewhat immediate, yet their relationship progresses slowly. Fourthly, according to MacLeod’s standard, Ford’s novel is a “good” historical fiction by not omitting “the less attractive pieces of the past to make . . . narratives meet