The Bitter Sea

Charles Li’s The Bitter Sea is a moving memoir that shows his rocky journey from youth into young adulthood. While the book focuses on his adolescence, it also explores aspects of life that are often difficult to confront. By addressing the hardships of parent to child relationships and political chaos in China, Li creates a memoir that embraces life as it is; filled with waves of both distress and happiness.

Regardless of cultural background, one is likely to identify with Li’s experiences. Friendship, loss, frustration, and discovery are all themes that play a role on his reflective story. Though the mood created by his various memories is often depressing, it allows one to truly step into Li’s shoes. As he provides vivid descriptions of events in his youth, one can almost feel the disappointment, joy, anger and eventually, the hopefulness that filled his life.

Though at certain points, it appears that Li was simply miserable, he creates a truthful yet fair portrayal of his earlier days. He shows that his father was a stern and detached figure, but at the same time, depicts him from two sets of eyes. By doing so, he creates a picture of his father and of his situation, as a whole, that is not completely biased.

While each chapter is organized in chronological order, one might notice that there is not always a smooth transition from one story to the next. This jolty feel to his memoir, however, is not necessarily a sign of unpolished writing. Rather, it mirrors how the actual events in his life took place; they were often abrupt and led to unexpected changes. Whether intentional or not, the relationship between his craggily told story and his rough life seem to make his memoir a powerful, real-life adventure.