"Pung shines when conveying the feelings of a child whose adulthood is fast approaching, and the emotions of a mother who is losing control.” — Washington Post
"Throughout, Pung effectively channels her protagonist’s restless outlook (“This guy wrote in the same way my mind seemed to meander these days,” Karuna says of Whitman). This is worth checking out." — Publishers Weekly
"For such a slim book, the story is deeply complex.... Subtle, difficult, lovely, and gorgeously written." — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Pung delicately teases out the common experience of a daughter resenting her mother and looking up to her father, made even more complex by fraught racial dynamics." — The Guardian
"A powerhouse story, a powerhouse voice, that wrestles with intragenerational fractures and complicated entanglements. At the center of the book is an obsessive kind of love, a love that gives but also takes, but a love that only forms from bonds forged in fire.” — Weike Wang, award-winning author of Joan Is Okay and Chemistry
"Alice Pung's One Hundred Days is a searingly intimate portrait of a fight for selfhood in a culturally complex family. As much as Karuna Kelly is writing to her baby about to be born, she's also trying to discern who to trust: her controlling mother or her absent father, her well-intentioned but distant teachers or the intrusive government officials who claim to be trying to help? I was riveted by Pung's lyrical prose in which separation is a threat that benefits and wounds at surprising turns." — Jimin Han, author of The Apology and A Small Revolution
“A compelling portrayal of the teetering movement from girl to woman. . . . A modern fairytale for and about those who live in housing commission flats, for those who don’t feel they are worth anything, those who feel like they don’t count.” — Sydney Review of Books (Australia)
"One Hundred Days will break your heart and, in the masterful hands of Alice Pung, put it back together. This is a moving, page-turning, emotional rollercoaster of a novel filled with searing observations, humor, and compassion. I absolutely loved it." — Tracey Lien, internationally bestselling author of All That’s Left Unsaid
“At the core of Pung’s work is a fearless emotional honesty and unapologetic exploration of what it means to be human.” — SBS Voices (Australia)
“One Hundred Days is the tale of mothers and daughters the world over—the relationships we navigate, the weight of our histories, and how, no matter the fractures life throws between us, our daughters will always hum us home. Pung’s characters are so real, I could feel them in the room. There is no word out of place, no sentence that doesn’t sing with poetry. This is truly fiction at its fiercest. It is a masterpiece, a triumph—Pung’s greatest work yet.” — Maxime Beniba Clark, author of Foreign Soil and The Hate Race
“A glorious song of a novel [that] can be savoured by young and old. . . . Pung changes our perceptions and sympathies, building characters with depth and complexity. . . . At its core, this is an uplifting story of a woman defining her own life, knowing that she will give her child the freedom to do the same.” — The Saturday Paper (Australia)
“A legit masterpiece. Funny in all the right places, sob-inducing at the end.” — Benjamin Law, author of The Family Law and Gaysia: Adventures in the Queer East
“One Hundred Days tells a story about growing up, discovering the difference between love and control, and taking responsibility. I loved the details: they spoke of a whole world. How I admired this young, determined protagonist. The book is wonderful; I read it all in one sitting.” — Sofie Laguna, author of One Foot Wrong, The Eye of the Sheep, The Choke, and Infinite Splendours
“Stunning. . . . One Hundred Days is Pung’s best work so far, but know that it will break your heart. . . . It’s here to challenge our perceptions of love, family and culture. It’s here to pull on our heartstrings and have us turn each page faster and faster, desperate to know the ending.” — Arts Hub (Australia)
“What is astounding about One Hundred Days is that, while fearlessly honest about the damage family members can inflict on one another, it is also full of forgiveness and harmony and grace. Pung’s discernment and command as a writer is astonishing, elating. I adore this book.” — Christos Tsioklas, author of Damascus, Merciless Gods, and The Slap
“One Hundred Days is, at heart, a deeply hopeful novel.” — Kill Your Darlings (Australia)
“One Hundred Days can be an uncomfortable read...but Pung’s writing is also infused with humour, warmth and an understanding of what it is to be both mother and daughter.” — Australian Book Review
“I devoured this book – a beautiful, funny, rude, deeply moving story.” — Virginia Trioli, author of Generation F
“A deceptively simple plot under which bubbles the latent power of raw emotional need and complicated love. Pung’s writing is liltingly lovely; every word careful and considered.” — Reading Monthly (Australia)
“Written with Pung’s characteristic verve and attention to detail and dialogue...it offers provocative treatment of the dynamics of control and uneasy acquiescence, of the working-class poor, of cross-cultural relationships, teen pregnancy and second-generation migrants.” — The Age (Australia)
“A thoughtful, finely observed book” — The West Australian
★ 2023-08-10
A story of teenage pregnancy, immigrant experience, and the mother-daughter relationship by Australian author Pung.
Karuna Kelly is the child of an unhappy marriage. Her father, a white, working-class Australian, dotes on her but has little regard for her mother, his mail-order bride from the Philippines. When they divorce, Karuna must live in a subsidized flat with her mother, whose narrow idea of health and success leads her to be critical and harsh. At 16, Karuna exercises her limited independence by having a fling with a local 19-year-old, becoming pregnant. The novel is written in Karuna's first-person voice as addressed to her baby, and the tone is raw and lyrical, hopeless and hopeful at the same time. Her mother controls her to an abusive extent, limiting her access to the outside world and rejecting medical advice in favor of old-time traditions. Karuna increasingly chafes against this treatment, aching for help but stymied in her attempts to get it. For such a slim book, the story is deeply complex. Pung shows people of different heritages mixing in this poor community, the insular quality of diaspora, and the different expectations placed on Karuna for being biracial. She also shows—and Karuna is aware of this to varying degrees—that Karuna's mother’s actions are driven by trauma and love, not maliciousness, and that this both excuses them and doesn’t. Karuna’s experience of pregnancy is intimately, vividly detailed. As it progresses, she becomes resigned and depressed, but when the baby is born, there is the possibility of change.
Subtle, difficult, lovely, and gorgeously written.
