Paper Wife, a Novel –by Laila Ibrahim

Fiction / Historical, China, California

293 pages / 4223

5 Stars

I’d read about Ghost Brides, Picture Brides, Mail-Order Brides, but never a Paper Wife. The title alone was enough to grab my attention. A paper wife is none of the aforementioned—she is a lie. 

Mei Ling’s older sister Jah Jeh was brokered in marriage to a Chinese man, Chinn Kai Li, who lived in San Francisco. In 1923 it was extremely difficult for Chinese to immigrate to the US, but he was married, lied about his occupation, and came to China to collect his wife and young son. His first wife died just before he arrived. He had all the paperwork for his first wife, and it could not be changed, so he hired a broker to find him a suitable wife to care for his young son, Bo. The marriage would be the following day, and Jah Jeh would have to become his first wife, at least until through immigration.

Jah Jeh gets sick, and Mei Ling gets married to her sister’s betrothed, finds herself with a husband, a very young son, and on a voyage (steerage) to San Francisco. En route, she studies her book, all about her husband’s first wife. By the time they get to San Francisco, she realizes she is pregnant. How will he react? Will she be out of Immigration before the baby is born? Will she be deported? Will he keep her if the baby is a girl? What will happen if he finds out she is not who he thinks she is? All valid questions, and fearful ones.

On the ship she meets a six-year-old girl, who she wants to keep. The girl is in the women’s section, her uncle in the men’s, so Mei Ling “adopts” her. At least for the voyage. Mei Ling wants to make it permanent; will her new husband agree? Adopting a girl is not the usual thing a newlywed couple do. 

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. It was a fascinating insight into 1920s China, and even more, into the treatment of the Chinese on our shores. Basically, it is a story of an arranged marriage, a marriage built on lies, and how the couple grow, how Mei Ling adapts to a new country, a new culture, and I couldn’t put it down! I really hated for it to end.