It's a bright sunny Saturday in Australia, and crowds of people converge on the Circular Quay in Sydney, with its views of the landmark Opera House and bridge. Among them are four people who interpret what they see in very different ways due to their histories and circumstances. First is Ellie, a transplant from the countryside, who is meeting up with her former childhood lover for the first time in years. James is eager to meet Ellie, hoping that connecting with her can help him heal from a traumatic event which he cannot overcome on his own. Catherine has just moved to Australia from Ireland and is only starting to recover from the grief of losing her brother. Pei Xing suffered greatly during the Cultural Revolution in China and emigrated to Australia hoping to start a new life, but finding a fragment of her old.

Each character's backstory is complicated and messy, as are most people's, and Jones does an excellent job at threading the stories together. Commonalities pop up in unexpected places—Doctor Zhivago, the ferries, a missing child—yet each character is unique and fully formed. Small acts of kindness among strangers are impactful for all four characters, and the interconnected nature of social interaction is a major theme. Sydney, and the Circular Quay in particular, is like another character, influencing each of the four in different ways, and being interpreted by each of the four in different ways, sometimes differently in the same day. For instance, one person thinks the Opera House resembles a body bent in a graceful curve, another a hooded eye. What one person can see as beautiful and containing hope, another sees as foreboding.

I thought I knew where the book was going, led in part by the jacket flap description, but the ending was a surprise and darker than I anticipated. But the plot is beside the point. The real beauty of the book lies in the character descriptions and the setting and atmosphere. The author reminds us that we are all of us connected in a myriad of ways, if only we could see it. ( )

I enjoyed her excellent prose and superb, precise descriptions. Initially I thought the language very pedantic and pretentious, but then I started to appreciate her accurate vivid descriptions.
She cleverly wove her diverse characters and their lives to intersect at Sydney’s quayside. All her characters seemed alive, very real, and believable.
I found many growing up memories were stirred for me.
Her thorough research, spending time in China and Ireland, is clearly apparent.
An excellent book.
( )

Didn't quite work for me, for no real reason. It's beautifully written, but little happens, and I wasn't in the mood for that today. Also, James made me impatient, and I felt that Ellie and Catherine were really too similar to each other. Maybe the real problem is that I am also reading Assassin's Apprentice and Derby Day, and those books are more fun and more what I feel like reading right now. I will definitely give this one another try in a few months, to see if it really is just about my mood. ( )

Didn't quite work for me, for no real reason. It's beautifully written, but little happens, and I wasn't in the mood for that today. Also, James made me impatient, and I felt that Ellie and Catherine were really too similar to each other. Maybe the real problem is that I am also reading Assassin's Apprentice and Derby Day, and those books are more fun and more what I feel like reading right now. I will definitely give this one another try in a few months, to see if it really is just about my mood. ( )

Beautiful, buoyant prose but the lack of dialogue eventually led me to conclude that I couldn't engage.