As the line of characters who have an association with Sylvie grows, Amy gradually uncovers her extended family’s secrets, including the existence of precious jewels that may explain her sister’s disappearance.
Philip, an attractive musician who gave Sylvie cello lessons before her disappearance, also re-enters the picture, beginning to show a sudden romantic interest in Amy. Helena Tan, who raised Sylvie, is resentful about having never received her dues for this and does not seem concerned about her missing niece. Amy feels hurt that her sister kept so much from her, but is determined to continue the search. The timid Amy leaves New York for the Netherlands, where she stays with the Tans and discovers that Sylvie had quit her job and broken things off with her husband. The narrative voice switches between Sylvie, Amy, and their mother, simply called “Ma”. Searching for Sylvie Lee, the latest novel from Jean Kwok, author of Girl in Translation (2010), moves back and forth across the months leading to Sylvie’s disappearance.
So when Sylvie suddenly goes missing in the Netherlands, where she was last seen visiting her grandmother on her deathbed, Amy knows she must set out in search of her. These two daughters of Chinese immigrants have very different beginnings and personalities, but they are devoted to each other. Aged nine, she returned to her parents and baby sister, Amy.
Sylvie spent the early years of her life in the Netherlands with their relatives, the Tans, while her parents scraped together a living in New York. Remove the extra and that’s me: ordinary.” With her Harvard degree, high-powered consultancy job and wealthy American husband, in Amy’s mind, “Sylvie is extraordinary. Amy Lee believes that her older sister, Sylvie, is everything she can never hope to be.
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