Dial A for Aunties
DETAILS: Series: Aunties, #1 Publisher: Berkley Publication Date: April 27, 2021 Format: Paperback Length: 320 Read Date: August 12-13
“Easy,” Big Aunt sniffs, shaking her head. “I don’t think it’l be that easy.”
“Why not?” Second Aunt says, raising her chin,
Big Aunt shrugs. “Because it’s never easy. Otherwise people would get away with murder all the time.”
I wince at the word “murder,” even though she said it in Mandarin. And even though I want to have faith in Second Aunt’s simple plan of “get there, find cooler, bring cooler back,” I have a feeling that Big Aunt is right. When it comes to hiding a dead body, it’s never simple—a lesson I’m quickly learning from the previous night.
What’s Dial A for Aunties About?
I feel compelled to assure you that I am not making this up—Jesse Q. Sutanto did. But as I try to summarize this, it feels like I’m just typing random words onto the screen.
Meddy Chan is a photographer for her family wedding business—one auntie does the baking, one auntie helps with makeup and hair, her mother does the floral arrangements, and another auntie is in charge of the entertainment. Meddy wanted to do other things with her photography, but being a good filial daughter, she went along with her mother and aunties when they started the business. Their biggest wedding to date is just around the corner; there’s a pair of children of billionaires getting married at a resort and the Chans are on-board.
But first, Meddy’s mother has a surprise for her. For the last few weeks, she’s been posing as Meddy on a dating site, and things with one suitor have gotten to the point for their first in-person meeting. In just a few years. Meddy doesn’t have the time (or willingness) to explain to her mother how inappropriate this all is—so she goes on the date. Fast-forward: by the end of the night, he’s dead (accidentally). In her panic, Meddy doesn’t report this to the police or anyone. She drives home with the body in the trunk. Her mother calls her sisters in to help. They come up with a hare-brained scheme to dispose of the body after the big wedding and get some sleep before the big job.
Naturally, a mix-up happens when the helpers come and pack up things like the cake to take to the resort. They include the cooler the body is hidden in. While they scamper around trying to decide how to hide and/or dispose of the body while at the resort, Meddy’s college boyfriend, the love of her life, the one who got away (and the one her mother and aunties never knew about) shows up.
And then things start to get weird with the wedding.
And then…well, that’s about enough to get you started, right?
Why did I pick this up? Why did I keep reading?
I got this from a Blind Date with a Book last year at some event at Shared Stories—which was fine with me, I’ve enjoyed Sutanto’s Vera Wang books, and the one YA book by her I listened to wasn’t bad. But I put it on the back burner, and it likely would’ve stayed there except I needed”a book by an author who is not from the UK or USA” for The Book Tempter’s TBR Challenge, and this was the only one that fit. So…
I kept at it because I started laughing within pages—and then you add the dead body and everything else? You have to find out where it goes. I was still laughing and chuckling up to the end (along with uttering the occasional “awwww”). Because as goofy as the above section was…it gets wackier.
What does this book tell us about humanity?
“Meddy is probably cautious because last time when you tried to set her up with Wang Zhixiang’s son, he turned out to be, you know,” Fourth Aunt says.
Ma waves an irritated hand. “Why do you keep bringing up Zhixiang’s son? So he turned out to be some maniac. How was I supposed to know?”
“Kleptomaniac,” I mumble. By the time our date was over, he’d stolen my makeup bag from my purse and, somehow, one of my shoes. I mean, the guy’s an asshole, but you’ve gotta give it to him. Or let him steal it.
In a letter to the reader before the prologue, Sutanto talks about the origin and inspiration of the book (and explains the broken English of many of the characters) and writes, “I hope that this book gives you a little peek into the fierce love with which my family raised us and protects us to this day.” To go with that, there’s a lot about the role of family in the book. Not just Meddy’s family (although that’s so pervasive you could be forgiven for not noticing any others), but Nathan’s (the college boyfriend), and the families of the bride and groom.
These families are sources of comfort, security, aggravation. There are petty rivalries between the aunties that go back decades and will never be resolved—which doesn’t alter in the slightest their devotion to each other—it just flavors it (I’m not 100% certain they even notice them). I’m sure at least one auntie realizes how insane it was for Meddy’s mother to pose as her on a dating site, but doesn’t say anything.
And whether it’s family by blood and birth, a family by choice, a found family, or…whatever. There’s something that everyone can identify with, something that everyone can see themselves in. Something we can all learn from and see humanity in. It might be easier to see it in an eccentric collection of fictional relatives than in our own—but we can then transfer that into our non-fictional families.
So, what did I think about Dial A for Aunties?
Now we know, when it comes to fight or flight, I am neither. I am: freeze like a hamster and then melt into a useless shivery puddle.
Before I get into anything else—I love Meddy’s description of groom-zillas, and how they’re a bigger problem than any supposed bride-zillas. And then this is borne out by the actual bride and groom for this particular wedding.
If you just had the long-lost love showing up at the wedding gig, the story wouldn’t have been as good. If you just had the Chans dealing with the corpse and the wedding, it would’ve been funny, but it wouldn’t carry much emotional weight. If you had the corpse and the long-lost love storylines…I’m not sure any comedy would’ve survived. But somehow when you combine the three elements with Sutanto’s gift for storytelling and comedy, it’s just magic. Madcap magic, but magic.
I’m sure there’s more to be said about the book, but I’m drawing a blank on it. It’s just… Ridiculous. Deliciously ridiculous. Ridiculously sweet. You’ve gotta read this.
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