The Garden of Evening Mists - Eng, Tan Twan

One of the first books I saw for my trial subscription on Kindle Unlimited. I had clocked it in a Guardian review and put it on the back burner - I can't buy every book I read about. But, here, for free - absolutely. But it is far better than that. So far so generic - so to say something meaningful about it.  The descriptions ( fuck this is going to sound like a school essay) of the garden are so wonderfully peaceful and well formed. They contrast with the horror that is laid on in spades of the wars and politics that surround the concept and making of the peaceful garden. The cruelty of the Japanese internment in Malaysia, the Malaya "Emergency" - a war by any other name but so called so that the planters could still claim on their insurance (apparently - source Wikipedia), the Boer Wars and the British savageries there - don't forget the Brits invented the concentration camp. There is a beautiful moment where the protagonist dips her head to take some water from a stone basin, and in the act of doing so is able to see the mountains framed by a gap in the hedge only visible if you dip your head to take the water. It is a mimicry or copy ( wrong words) of a famous garden in Japan where, against all the advice a master gardener cut off the view of the mountains with a hedge  as it  was too precious to be seen without effort and humility.