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WORK TITLE: Yesterday
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 1980
WEBSITE: http://www.feliciayap.com/
CITY: London, England
STATE:
COUNTRY: United Kingdom
NATIONALITY:
http://www.mulhollandbooks.com/author/feliciayap/
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born 1980, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; immigrated to United Kingdom, 2000.
EDUCATION:Attended Imperial College London; Cambridge University, master’s degree, Ph.D.; graduate of Faber Academy’s novel-writing program.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Has worked as radioactive-cell biologist at European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg, Germany, war historian, CambridgeUniversity lecturer, technology journalist, theatre critic, flea-market trader, and catwalk model.
WRITINGS
Contributor to periodicals, including Economist and Business Times.
SIDELIGHTS
Felicia Yap had a varied work history before becoming a novelist. On her website, she notes that she has been “a radioactive-cell biologist, a war historian, a Cambridge lecturer, a technology journalist, a theatre critic, a flea-market trader and a catwalk model.” She grew up in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and came to England in 2000 to attend University College London, and after finishing her degree there went to work for the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg, Germany. There she discovered “that the sterile environment wasn’t for me,” she told London Evening Standard interviewer Katie Law. She returned to England and studied history at Cambridge University. She eventually joined the Cambridge faculty and also worked as a journalist before entering the novel-writing program at London’s Faber Academy. She decided to take that course after receiving a Facebook friend request from a woman who thought she recognized Yap from the program. “I thought that if someone else thinks I’m a student there, it may well be written in the stars that I should become one,” she told Law. The program has produced several best-selling novelists, including Renée Knight, Rachel Joyce, and Chloe Esposito.
Yap’s debut novel, Yesterday, is a thriller set in a dystopian version of Cambridge. In this world, everyone loses their long-term memory when they reach adulthood. Some can remember the previous forty-eight hours of their life; they are called Duos and are society’s privileged class. Others, called Monos, remember only the prior twenty-four hours and are consigned to menial labor. The only way anyone knows their longer history is by referring to the records they have entered in electronic devices known as iDiaries, which may be under government surveillance. The plot turns on the discovery of the body of Sophia Alyssa Ayling, drowned in the River Cam. Sophia, who believed herself to be the only person in the world with a full memory, had used her brains, looks, and charm to seduce and manipulate others, and she had been having an affair with Mark Henry Evans, a married novelist and aspiring politician. His name is found in Sophia’s iDiary, and their relationship leads police to suspect he had something to do with her death. He denies any culpability, but his wife, Claire–a Mono in the unusual situation of being married to a Duo–and police detective Hans Richardson are not inclined to believe him. Richardson is also a Mono, but he has been passing as a Duo for years because of his success in solving crimes. The lack of long-term memory in any part of the population, however, makes his investigations challenging, and this one is no exception. The story is told from multiple viewpoints, including that of Sophia, via her diary.
In addition to being a crime novel, Yesterday is a commentary on modern-day dependence on electronic gadgets. “I wanted the book to reflect our obsession with technology as a medium for remembering,” Yap told Law. Also, it reflects fear of memory loss. “To forget our own pasts is to forget our identities and sense of self,” she told the interviewer. “That’s why we’re obsessed with recording everything on our smartphones, taking selfies and tweeting—because they’re forms of remembering. I wanted to tell a story that taps deep into our innermost fears.” To another interviewer, Malay Mail contributor Zurairi Ar, she noted: “In terms of books which specifically inspired Yesterday, I found Tender Is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald … the other is Kazuo Ishiguro, I like Never Let Me Go … Kazuo is amazing because I love the understated, precise nature of his storytelling and just the surreal beauty of his prose.”
Yap received some critical praise for her storytelling in Yesterday. The novel “is perfect summertime reading for sci-fi geeks and murder mystery fans,” reported Joyce Lau in the South China Morning Post. Yap, Lau continued, “has created a carnival fun-house mirror reflection of our digitally obsessed lives,” while also lampooning the British class system. Chicago Tribune reviewer Lloyd Sachs remarked positively on Yesterday as well. “To tantalizing degrees, Yap reinvents the unreliable narrator by ingeniously weaving together true, imagined and fabricated back stories,” he related. A Kirkus Reviews contributor, however, did not care for the novel. “The central conceit, surely meant to be edgy, doesn’t add anything to a thoroughly unimaginative murder mystery,” the critic maintained, adding that the major characters are unsympathetic. Lau acknowledged that “the characters are not particularly deep or likeable,” particularly Mark and Sophia, but she found Claire and Hans more interesting. She concluded: “Ultimately, Yesterday doesn’t make any earth-shattering revelations about society, technology or memory–but it doesn’t have to. It’s a quick-paced summer read filled with action, intrigue and sex, with a futuristic twist that keeps it original.” A Publishers Weekly commentator termed the novel an “ingenious debut” in which “Yap fully exploits her provocative premise.” She is “less convincing with her characters’ psychology,” the reviewer continued, but nonetheless summed up Yesterday as “a deviously delicious diversion.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Chicago Tribune, October 16, 2017, Lloyd Sachs, review of Yesterday.
Evening Standard (London, England), August 9, 2017, Katie Law, “How Yesterday Author Felicia Yap Went from Facebook to Thriller Fiction Queen.”
Kirkus Reviews, June 1, 2017, review of Yesterday.
Malay Mail, August 27, 2017, Zurairi Ar, “10 Things about: Felicia Yap, Scientist-Turned-Thriller Novelist.”
Publishers Weekly, June 19, 2017, review of Yesterday. p. 94.
South China Morning Post, June 26, 2017, Joyce Lau, review of Yesterday.
ONLINE
Felicia Yap Website, http://www.feliciayap.com (April 15, 2018).
Mulholland Books Website, http://www.mulhollandbooks.com/ (April 15, 2018), brief biography.
feliciayap
feliciayap
© Deian Tabakov
Twitter
Felicia Yap grew up in Kuala Lumpur. She read biochemistry at Imperial College London, followed by a doctorate in history (and a half-blue in competitive ballroom dancing) at Cambridge University. She has written for 'The Economist' and the 'Business Times'. She has also been a radioactive-cell biologist, a war historian, a Cambridge lecturer, a technology journalist, a theatre critic, a flea-market trader and a catwalk model. Felicia lives in London and is a recent graduate of the Faber Academy's novel-writing program.
Quoted in Sidelights: “a radioactive-cell biologist, a war historian, a Cambridge lecturer, a technology journalist, a theatre critic, a flea-market trader and a catwalk model.”
About
Felicia Yap Profile Photo
Felicia Yap grew up in Kuala Lumpur. She has written for The Economist and The Business Times. She has also been a radioactive-cell biologist, a war historian, a Cambridge lecturer, a technology journalist, a theatre critic, a flea-market trader and a catwalk model.
Felicia lives in London and is a graduate of the Faber Academy’s novel-writing programme. Her debut thriller Yesterday will be published by Headline (UK), Little Brown (US) and around the world in August 2017.
Quoted in Sidelights: “that the sterile environment wasn’t for me,”
“I thought that if someone else thinks I’m a student there, it may well be written in the stars that I should become one,”
“I wanted the book to reflect our obsession with technology as a medium for remembering,”
“To forget our own pasts is to forget our identities and sense of self. That’s why we’re obsessed with recording everything on our smartphones, taking selfies and tweeting—because they’re forms of remembering. I wanted to tell a story that taps deep into our innermost fears.”
How Yesterday author Felicia Yap went from Facebook to thriller fiction queen
A chance social media message encouraged Felicia Yap to try writing a novel. Now Hollywood is beating a path to her door, says Katie Law
KATIE LAW
Wednesday 9 August 2017 15:25
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Author, academic, journalist, university lecturer, biologist, war historian and model, Felicia Yap
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Felicia Yap had never heard of the Faber Academy until she got a friend request on Facebook from someone who claimed they recognised her from the Faber writing course.
Yap, a Malaysian-born biochemist-turned-historian — and now novelist — is explaining how she came to clinch a “healthy” six-figure advance for her debut novel, Yesterday, in a two-book deal, negotiated by literary super-agent Jonny Geller, joint CEO at Curtis Brown, no less.
“I thought that if someone else thinks I’m a student there, it may well be written in the stars that I should become one,” says Yap, smiling, matter-of-factly. The story is a peculiar one. Yap, 36, accepted the Facebook request from the stranger — “she looked lovely” — and became friends with the woman who, she insists, was not out to recruit her. Nonetheless after learning more about the Faber Academy, Yap decided to enrol. The part-time, six-month, course, which costs £4,000, is famous for nurturing best-selling novelists, from S J Watson, Renée Knight and Rachel Joyce to this year’s Chloe Esposito, Alice Feeney and Sam Hepburn.
Interestingly many if not most of the graduates have produced “high-concept” novels which have been eagerly snapped up by literary agents and publishers for hefty advances — high-concept being more important these days than whether or not the author can actually write. Think foreign rights and Hollywood big bucks.
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Pitched by the publisher Wildfire (a new imprint from Hachette) as a combination of before I Go to Sleep and Minority Report, Yap’s high-concept novel might just as easily be termed dementia-meets-technology. As she herself is the first to admit, these are two of our biggest preoccupations.
“Dementia scares the shit out of all of us,” she says. “To forget our own pasts is to forget our identities and sense of self. That’s why we’re obsessed with recording everything on our smartphones, taking selfies and tweeting — because they’re forms of remembering. I wanted to tell a story that taps deep into our innermost fears.”
Yesterday is set in Cambridge in a kind of parallel dystopian world (dystopias also being very big right now) where everyone loses their memory when they grow up. There are Monos, who can only remember the past 24 hours, and Duos, who have 48-hour recall. The Duos appear to have the advantage over the Monos, especially when trying to solve a murder that was committed 48 hours ago. But this being high-concept, Yap’s story is also full of unexpected twists and turns, along with the requisite sprinkles of revenge, lust and love.
an127105544author-academic-.jpg
(Daniel Hambury/Stella Pictures)
“I’m interested in the question of why we remember things, how we make memories, what we choose to remember and forget, and our capacity for self-delusion,” Yap continues. “Studies suggest that 80 per cent of what we remember isn’t what really happened.”
Her characters record what happens to them each day on an iDiary device, a techie detail that has already gone down especially well in selfie-centric South-East Asia, “where people are glued to their smartphones all the time”.
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She’s hooked too, she admits, so badly in fact that, when she discovered she’d left her smartphone at home this morning, she had to get her economist fiancé, Alexander Plekhanov — whom she met while doing competitive ballroom dancing in Cambridge — to fetch it from their Greenwich home. “I actually felt naked,” she says, looking down and pulling her hair over her shoulders. “So, I wanted the book to reflect our obsession with technology as a medium for remembering. Studies suggest that using Google affects our capacity to remember, paradoxically, because we don’t need to.”
To muster the necessary concentration to finish off the final draft, Yap booked herself into a hotel near London City Airport for five days. “You only get one chance and I didn’t want to screw it up. I really wanted it to be right. The day I checked out at noon I was too terrified to send it out and just sat in the hotel lobby until 5pm. Eventually I thought: ‘Sod it, I’m going to send it out.’ Of the 24 agents [who had originally expressed an interest at the Faber Academy graduates’ open day] I sent it to eight because they tell you to stagger submissions. I thought I’d have six weeks of peace but the next morning Jonny [Geller] rang saying he’d read half and could we meet. I nearly fell off my chair.”
yesterday-by-felicia-yap.jpg
Known for being commercially astute — his stable includes John le Carré, David Nicholls and Adele Parks, Geller rejected a pre-emptive offer for Yap’s manuscript from one major publisher and took it to what became a heated auction last year. “I remember when the final figures came in I was looking at my phone thinking, ‘No, this can’t be for real,’” says Yap. “I was, like, collapsing on the floor, literally, and my partner was saying, ‘What’s wrong?’ It was that much of a surprise. When you work on something in isolation you never expect someone to respond to like that.”
With Hollywood directors beating a path to Yap’s door and a second novel under way — called Today — it’s a prequel to Yesterday (see, this is high-concept stuff) and set before everyone lost their memory — Yap’s tenacity and hard work seem to be paying off.
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She grew up in a “tiny house” in Kuala Lumpur, writing in Malay and speaking “pidgin English”, a mix of Malay, Cantonese and English. It’s clear when she speaks that English is not her first language. “My fiancé read my manuscript out loud three times so I could hear the prose and the dialogue, and if he stumbled over something I would fix it.”
Her father filled ATMs with cash for a living, her mother, “not a ‘tiger mother’”, was a clerk at a car repair shop. Yap came to the UK in 2000 to do a degree in biochemistry at Imperial College. She then worked at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg, decided “that the sterile environment wasn’t for me” and switched to studying history instead, winning a place at Cambridge to do a masters degree and then a PhD about Asian prisoners of war during the Second World War. She also worked as a journalist in Singapore.
“It’s very difficult to make the leap if you come from a less privileged background,” she says. “All my studies were funded by scholarships — nine in total — and the generosity of a benefactor who helped me with my undergraduate studies, which in turn paved the way for me to go to Cambridge.”
As a consequence, Yap has just announced she is funding a Curtis Brown “Yesterday” creative scholarship worth £3,000 from the proceeds of her book deal, to help someone else in a similar position. The winner, who should have at least one parent who didn’t go to university, will have the chance to work with an author-tutor on one of Curtis Brown’s novel-writing courses. “In keeping with the wonderful principle of paying it forward, I’d love to do the same today for a writing star of tomorrow.”
Yesterday, published by Wildfire, is out on Thursday, £12.99
Quoted in Sidelights: “In terms of books which specifically inspired Yesterday, I found Tender Is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald … the other is Kazuo Ishiguro, I like Never Let Me Go … Kazuo is amazing because I love the understated, precise nature of his storytelling and just the surreal beauty of his prose.”
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Cheras-born Felicia Yap made her much-anticipated debut, following the hype of a bidding war and a six-figure deal, with Yesterday, a crime thriller set in a world where most humans cannot remember beyond the prior 24 hours, last Thursday. — Picture by Tim Steele
Cheras-born Felicia Yap made her much-anticipated debut, following the hype of a bidding war and a six-figure deal, with Yesterday, a crime thriller set in a world where most humans cannot remember beyond the prior 24 hours, last Thursday. — Picture by Tim Steele
KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 27 — Born in Cheras, Felicia Yap made the leap to the United Kingdom to study biochemistry in Imperial College, London on a scholarship before joining the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg, Germany as a researcher.
She had dabbled in writing for The Economist and Singapore’s Business Times, and even read history at Cambridge University which provided the backdrop for her first novel as she took a dip into the life of an author after a stint at writing school Faber Academy.
Yesterday, a crime thriller set in a world where most humans cannot remember beyond the prior 24 hours, hit the UK bookshops last Thursday; a much-anticipated debut following the hype of a bidding war and a six-figure deal.
Now finishing up a prequel amid frenzied promotion appearances and negotiating a film deal, Yap spoke to Malay Mail Online from her home overlooking the River Thames, where seagulls could be heard in the background during our phone interview.
In her own words:
I’m a Cheras girl born and bred, really. The school where I went to, Convent Peel Road, was in Pudu. For my primary and secondary school, I’d commute between my house in Cheras to Pudu, that went on throughout my entire schooling in KL. It’s about 10 kilometres away from school to home.
I don’t think I would have gone to university all the way up to PhD if I didn’t get scholarships from funding bodies or from kind benefactors… So I want to help other people in the same position.
I think all life experiences help while you’re writing a book. Had I not gone to Cambridge I wouldn’t have written Yesterday, I wouldn’t have set the book there. I wouldn’t have populated the book with so many details about Cambridge.
The most important thing for writers is to keep going, especially if you’re working on the first draft. You really need something to keep yourself fascinated as a writer.
Ideas do come to me on the move. So, I write better literally on trains, on buses, on planes... I really just carry my laptop everywhere with me, and actually write stuff... just about everywhere. I really think buses work really well for me as an environment.
I’m quite an omnivorous reader. In terms of books which specifically inspired Yesterday, I found Tender Is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald… the other is Kazuo Ishiguro, I like Never Let Me Go... Kazuo is amazing because I love the understated, precise nature of his storytelling and just the surreal beauty of his prose.
For me the most important thing about characters is that they’re people who are relatable to, that people can identify with. So, I just use them for the point of view of getting the story across… I didn’t make any conscious decisions on who they were, what’s important is they fit the story I wanted to tell.
I actually think that the three things that make me happiest are writing, ballroom dancing and scuba diving. It’s all because there are these moments, scuba diving in particular where I’m out of the world for 60 minutes underwater.
There are very few things in life that makes you live in the present. We spend so many times remembering the past and thinking about the future. To be totally in the moment and enjoy each passing second, very few things have that insight for me.
Writing is the best thing ever. Maybe that’s why I write in the present tense. For Yesterday, it’s a very immediate story. It’s happening right now. Being in the present, that’s very important for me.
Quoted in Sidelights: “The central conceit, surely meant to be edgy, doesn’t add anything to a thoroughly unimaginative murder mystery,” t
Yap, Felicia: YESTERDAY
Kirkus Reviews.
(June 1, 2017):
COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Yap, Felicia YESTERDAY Mulholland Books/Little, Brown (Adult Fiction) $27.00 8, 1 ISBN: 978-0-316-
46525-0
In a world where long-term memory is a thing of the past, investigating a murder becomes a daunting
prospect indeed.In Yap's debut, set in 2015 England, a protein responsible for long-term memory is
genetically inhibited for everyone when they're either 18 or 23, creating Monos and Duos, respectively.
Everyone must keep a daily iDiary to consult regularly. Mark and Claire Evans have been married for 20
years, but they can't say it's a strong union. After all, homemaker Claire is a Mono, which means she can
only remember what happened yesterday, and Mark, an author with political aspirations, is a Duo who can
remember two days into the past. To most Duos, marrying a Mono is a quick way to become a social pariah,
as Monos are largely considered to be less intelligent. When the body of stunning Sophia Ayling is
discovered in the River Cam, Mark is questioned by the police because they find his name in her iDiary,
setting off a disastrous chain of events. The narrative moves between past and present and back and forth
among Mark, Claire, Sophia's iDiary entries, and the detective investigating the murder, DCI Hans
Richardson. Not one of these characters is appealing. Mark is a selfish jerk; Claire is self-demeaning to the
point of farce; Sophia, who is revealed to be a romantic (and wronged) blast from Mark's past, is cartoonish;
and DCI Richardson's inner monologue is plodding, giving him something of a Columbo vibe, but not in a
good way. The central conceit, surely meant to be edgy, doesn't add anything to a thoroughly unimaginative
murder mystery, and if someone were up to no good, all they'd have to do is alter their diaries and no one
would be the wiser, making the truth elusive and the possibility of justice remote. A twist in the final act
can't save this over-the-top revenge tale.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Yap, Felicia: YESTERDAY." Kirkus Reviews, 1 June 2017. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A493329336/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=3be38c6f.
Accessed 24 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A493329336
3/24/2018 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1521940814146 2/2
Quoted in Sidelights: ”ingenious debut”
“Yap fully exploits her provocative premise.”
“less convincing with her characters’ psychology,”
“ a deviously delicious diversion.”
Yesterday
Publishers Weekly.
264.25 (June 19, 2017): p94.
COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
* Yesterday
Felicia Yap. Mulholland, $27 (400p) ISBN 978-0-316-46525-0
Yap's ingenious debut, a psychological thriller set around Cambridge, England, posits a radically different
dual-class society: the elite duos, the 30% of the population who can remember the preceding two days of
their lives after age 23, and the stigmatized monos, capable of recalling only the previous 24 hours of their
lives after age 18. (Everyone is expected to fill in the gaps by studying the officially mandated daily entries
in their iDiaries.) This creates unique challenges for Det. Chief Insp. Hans Richardson as he starts to
investigate the apparent murder of stunning Sophia Ayling, whose body was found in the River Cam not far
from the mansion of bestselling novelist and novice politician Mark Henry Evans (with whom, according to
Sophia's iDiary, she had a rather intimate acquaintance) and his dutiful mono wife of 20 years, Claire. Yap
fully exploits her provocative premise: Richardson, a mono struggling to maintain his masquerade as a duo,
delves into the trio's pasts--insofar as they can be determined from potentially deceptive diary accounts.
Though she's less convincing with her characters' psychology, this still makes for a deviously delicious
diversion. Agent: Alexandra Machinist, ICM. (Aug.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Yesterda." Publishers Weekly, 19 June 2017, p. 94. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A496643876/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=27333953.
Accessed 24 Mar. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A496643876
Quoted in Sidelights: “is perfect summertime reading for sci-fi geeks and murder mystery fans,”
“has created a carnival fun-house mirror reflection of our digitally obsessed lives,”
“the characters are not particularly deep or likeable,”
“Ultimately, Yesterday doesn’t make any earth-shattering revelations about society, technology or memory–but it doesn’t have to. It’s a quick-paced summer read filled with action, intrigue and sex, with a futuristic twist that keeps it original.”
Book review: Felicia Yap’s thriller Yesterday turns lens on digitally obsessed society struck by short-term memory loss
In Malaysia-born author’s futuristic murder mystery, a quick-paced summer read filled with action, intrigue and sex, characters’ brains reboot after 24 and 48 hours, meaning all memories have to be logged in a digital diary
PUBLISHED : Monday, 26 June, 2017, 8:32am
UPDATED : Monday, 26 June, 2017, 8:32am
Joyce Lau
Joyce Lau
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By Felicia Yap
Mulholland Books
4/5 stars
Yesterday, the debut novel by Malaysia-born author Felicia Yap, is perfect summertime reading for sci-fi geeks and murder mystery fans.
This thriller is set in idyllic Cambridge, England, where Mark Henry Evans, a successful novelist and aspiring politician, lives in a spacious mansion with his pretty blonde wife, Claire.
The twist is that, in this alternative reality, nobody has long-term memory. The world is divided into “Duos”, who can remember things for two days, and the inferior “Monos”, who can only recall events for one day. In a society entirely dependent on technology, the human brain essentially crashes every 24 or 48 hours, and needs to be rebooted.
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People do retain basic facts about themselves – names, spouses, jobs, addresses – so that society can at least function. But most short-term memories are stored in devices called iDiaries, in a not-too-subtle jab at the ubiquitousness of Apple. Every night, responsible citizens update that day’s details into their iDiaries, which the authorities may or may not be keeping under surveillance. The next morning, the world’s citizens reach for the glowing iDiary on their kitchen counters, to catch up with where they left off with their lives.
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The story starts with Claire Evans, who knows she has been trapped at home in a sobbing, hysterical state for 24 hours, although she cannot figure out the reason, only that it was “something nightmarish”. She did not record it in her iDiary, so the details of that trauma are gone from her mind forever.
Author of Yesterday, Felicia Yap.
Her husband knows – since he is a Duo – but he’s not telling.
The couple are rattled by the morning news on the radio, which reports that a woman was found drowned near their home in the River Cam. Soon enough, the police are on their doorstep, questioning Mark about his relationship to the mysterious murdered blonde, whom they identify as Sophia Alyssa Ayling.
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The author has already teased the reader with a description of Sophia in the book’s prologue, set two years before the murder. Sophia describes herself as a once-plain girl, with “a flat chest and protruding ears”, who spent 17 years in an insane asylum. Now that she is free and rich, she plans on transforming herself into a seductress and murderer who will seek revenge on her rivals.
Sophia thinks she is the only known person on earth to have a full memory, meaning she feels she can literally get away with murder.
Yesterday is an obvious parody of England’s class system. “Duos”, such as Mark Evans, are university-educated professionals who own tech companies, run governments, and go on tropical vacations. “Monos” are basically white trash, depicted here as ex-strippers, low-level cops, and people with tattoos.
If a “Mono” girl is blessed with beauty – and in this book, that invariably means being a peroxided and Botoxed Barbie with implants – then maybe that “Mono” girl can marry a “Duo”.
Yesterday is also a commentary on modern society, where people use their phones as alarm clocks, calendars, cameras, entertainment, news feed and messengers.
In Yip’s Cambridge, everyone relies on technology to remind themselves of who they are - some would say, much like today.
Murder mysteries generally involve a lot of questions: “Where were you last Wednesday? Have the neighbours been acting strangely? Is there a clue to be found in your home?” Only in Yesterday, the characters have to answer each query by doing a keyword search on their iDiaries and then staring into screens. Yap has created a carnival fun-house mirror reflection of our digitally obsessed lives.
If there is one weakness in this debut novel, it is that the characters are not particularly deep or likeable. Sophia may be a fascinating, murderous beauty – but she is also vain, superficial and foul-mouthed, and there are only so many descriptions of her lingerie and stilettos a reader can take.
Mark, although redeemed in part by the end, spends much of his time being pompous and vaguely terrible to his wife.
Book review: a new contender for the Great Chinese-American Novel
One feels far more sympathy for side characters such as Hans Richardson, a police detective who is secretly a Mono but has passed for a Duo thanks to his amazing ability to solve cases in the 24 hours before his memory fails him. Same goes for Claire, the hapless Mono trophy wife who turns out to be more interesting than she first seems.
Ultimately, Yesterday doesn’t make any earth-shattering revelations about society, technology or memory – but it doesn’t have to. It’s a quick-paced summer read filled with action, intrigue and sex, with a futuristic twist that keeps it original.
Quoted in Sidelights: “To tantalizing degrees, Yap reinvents the unreliable narrator by ingeniously weaving together true, imagined and fabricated back stories,”
'Yesterday' by Felicia Yap reviewed in this week's crime fiction roundup
Crime Fiction
“Parting Shot,” “The Blinds” and “Yesterday” (Doubleday Canada, Ecco, Mulholland)
Lloyd Sachs
Chicago Tribune
“Yesterday” by Felicia Yap, Mulholland, 400 pages, $27
In the alternative dimension of "Yesterday," the world consists of Duos, people who have two days of short-term memory, and Monos, a persecuted minority who can remember only as far back as yesterday. To keep track of their lives, everyone must rely on the iDiary, on which they record their daily histories. "You know you were happy only afterwards," says noted Duo novelist and aspiring Parliamentarian Mark Henry Evans. After the body of his mistress, Sophia, is pulled from the river near his home in eastern England, he swears he had nothing to do with her death. But Evans' Mono wife, Claire — theirs is a rare mixed marriage, and she's rare in refusing to accept her lower status — isn't so sure. Nor is the cop bent on solving the murder before the clock strikes tomorrow.
He has his work cut out for him, considering that everyone, including him, is concealing something about themselves whether they're aware of it or not. To tantalizing degrees, Yap reinvents the unreliable narrator by ingeniously weaving together true, imagined and fabricated back stories. Her debut is told from four perspectives, including that of the victim through her "revenge journal." Was Sophia, institutionalized for many years, delusional in stating she possessed full memory? Her moving observation that "it's the sum total of minuscule remembered gestures that makes love powerful" inspires regret that she's no longer around to prove her shocking claim.
“The Blinds” by Adam Sternbergh, Ecco, 400 pages, $26.99
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Lost memories of a very different sort are at the heart of "The Blinds," the latest novel by the acclaimed author of "Shovel Ready." In it, participants in an experimental witness-protection-type program in a tiny, isolated county in Texas have had their brains scrubbed, leaving them with no knowledge of who they were or what they did. That's saying something, considering many of them were killers, rapists and child abusers.
Bearing new names taken from lists of Hollywood stars and U.S. vice presidents, the nearly 50 residents are shut off from the outside world. There is no internet or cellphone service. All is relatively peaceful until a suicide and murder shock the town and a resident's coydogs — dogs crossed with coyotes — are set on fire. Sheriff Calvin Cooper assures everyone he'll get to the bottom of the freakish violence, but he knows more than he's letting on. As in "Westworld," an outside company is pulling lethal strings. And as in "The Leftovers," the fate of a single mother (with whom Cooper has a past) hangs in the balance.
Sternbergh cheats on his premise: Wouldn't violent impulses continue to spring from the DNA of bad characters even after their memories are expunged? But "The Blinds" is so wickedly entertaining, we don't much care. This revisionist Western is a whip-smart addition to the literature of false reality.
“Parting Shot” by Linwood Barclay, Doubleday Canada, 464 pages, $27
A series of killings, many resulting from the poisoning of the town water supply in Linwood Barclay's previous novel, "The Twenty-Three,” haunt the upstate New York village of Promise Falls. But for police detective Barry Duckworth and private investigator Cal Weaver, there's no time to mourn. Two young local men have been targeted by a vigilante website called Just Desserts. One of them is 18-year-old Jeremy Pilford, widely ridiculed on social media as "The Big Baby" after not being prosecuted for drunkenly running over a woman with a car because he was too pampered to know he was doing something wrong. And in a case of mistaken abduction, 20-something Brian Gaffney wanders into town in a daze after being missing for two days, with no knowledge of why a murder confession was crudely tattooed on his back or the identity of the "Sean" he is supposed to have killed.
As Duckworth and Weaver unravel their respective mysteries and go to great lengths to protect intended victims, they find themselves working through issues involving their own sons. The family theme is in play in other ways, some creepy and some affecting. But "Parting Shot," one of the best entries in Barclay's "Promise Falls" series, never bogs down in sentiment. It's too busy springing plot turns.
Lloyd Sachs, a freelancer, writes regularly on crime fiction for the Chicago Tribune.