For Fiji, I read A Remarkable Rotuman Woman: A Memoir by Jacinta Tonga. There were not a lot of options for Fiji, but this book was a great choice for my Read Around the World quest.

This book is the author’s memoir of her grandmother Petera Veu, who lived on the island of Rotuma in Fiji. In the prologue, Tonga explains:

I did not research this book, nor did I ask my mum, uncles, aunties, cousins or any other family members for their opinions. I want this book to be my story of how I remember her and her stories that she told me.

I have asked myself if these stories could be possible — could they have really happened or did she make it up — but you know the bottom line is I don’t care. I want to remember her as she would want me to remember her and I want the same for my children, grandchildren and whoever else wants to read her story to know her as I have known her.

A Remarkable Rotuman Woman by Jacinta Tonga, page V.

I appreciated the author’s candor and bluntness, and it set me up for a very enjoyable experience with her book. If you read this book expecting one of the great works of literature, you will be disappointed. But if you read this book with an open mind, hoping to get insights into a different culture in a different part of the world, then you will be delighted by the author’s feisty grandma who raised hell at Catholic school and kept raising hell until the day she died.

On my list, Fiji comes right after Ethiopia, and my pick for Ethiopia was also a memoir written by a granddaughter. I love when these serendipities happen! There was Austria and Azerbaijan, two consecutive books about musicians. Then Bahrain and Bangladesh, two consecutive books that explored Muslim marriage with Bahrian romanticizing and idealizing the subservient wife and Bangladesh burning the institution of Muslim marriage to the ground. For Chile and China, I read a novel (House of the Spirits) and a family history (Wild Swans) but both books told the stories of multiple generations of women in the same family living during tumultuous times. I have no idea when these serendipities will happen, but they are so fun and rewarding when they occur.

The memoirs I read for Ethiopia and Fiji are very different. The Wife’s Tale: A Personal History (Ethiopia) is some of the best writing I’ve ever read. If I was teaching a class about memoirs, I would include it in my syllabus because it demonstrates the best of the genre. A Remarkable Rotuman Woman is much more conversational, and the author was a nurse who felt called to preserve her grandmother’s stories, not a writer who has studied and practiced the craft for years and years and has access to a professional editor and all the advantages of a publisher. But after reading The Wife’s Tale for Ethiopia, I was delighted to read more stories about a bad ass grandma, and I’m glad Jacinta Tonga preserved this slice of history for future generations.

Not every book needs to be Hemingway, folks. Writing and publishing accomplish many different things, and this book saved memories of life on a remote island. I think that’s a wonderful reason to write a book.