I face facts with David Guterson

Snow Falling on Cedars ***
By David Guterson

I heard David Guterson on "The Diane Rheam Show" on PBS and figured it was time I read this book, which is beloved by many.

The frame for this story is the murder trial of a Japanese-American accused of murdering a white man. It's set about a decade after the end of World War II, when racial feeling against the Japanese among whites and resentment by Japanese-Americans over their internment were running high.

At its most compelling, Guterson's narrative explores the nature of facts: Can anyone have all the facts? How does one decide what facts are relevant? What does one deduce from the facts to hand? What does that say about one's prejudices? What happens when people withhold facts? What happens when people don't want to face facts?

The book is saved from a deus ex machina ending (mostly) by the protagonist's moral dilemma about withholding or presenting a key fact.

The book's weakness is a tendency for Japanese-American characters to show stereotypical traits like stoicism, inscrutability, a preoccupation with tradition. The author seems to struggle to fully realize the female protagonist; he often seems distracted by her exotic beauty and actually compares her to a geisha at one point.

Spare me.