Safe Return Doubtful

translated from the Thai by Mui Poopoksakul

This is a charming fictional memoir told by a ninety year old monk that reads like a piece of non-fiction. Luang Paw Tien shares anecdotes of jungle life in Thailand before his village’s transition to large-scale farming and urban development; these he relates verbally to the gathered children of the village.

His favourite tales are from his childhood, and bring out in him a sort of childhood innocence, when otherwise the community sees him as an eccentric.

The characters that populate the stories he tells are boars, snakes, monkeys, elephants, crocodiles, and tigers. Into his own collection of experiences there is an undercurrent of folklore, of traditonal belief, a smattering of the fantastical, a faint aroma of the supernatural.

Its midway through the piece when a plot takes shape, and it involves a tiger. Reading pace gathers for a sensational climax.

My GoodReads score 4 / 5