A Hundred Suns: A Novel

Historical fiction novels can tend to have trouble fitting fictional characters into real-world events, or if profiling a real person trying to make them sound authentic when not much might be known about them. This book tells the story of Jessie Lesage who is married to Victor who is an heir to the Michelin rubber fortune. They arrived in French Indochina in the 1930s, before war breaks out across the region, so Victor and Jessie can escape scandal back in Paris. Jessie throws herself into the world of colonial Vietnam, as scandal and war break out around her.

This book was confusing at times, and it was hard to follow certain times of what was happening, who was talking, thinking, or doing something. Also, the main characters are not exactly people I would call heroes. Her ruminations frankly almost stop the book cold and do not add much more than more pages to read. Victor is pretty much a non-entity for most of the book, except when it comes to money. Jessie’s look at colonialism is a particularly American view, that it is a civilizing force in the world.