‘If You Could See the Sun’ Review // magic realist take on invisibility sheds light on problems in academia

The age-old icebreaker question: If you could have any superpower, which would you choose? That’s right, all of your Marvel dreams could come true. Would you choose the kachow-esque nature of super speed? X-Ray vision? Shapeshifting? To have the Dorito-shaped bod of Captain America? What about invisibility, eh? 

In “If You Could See the Sun” by Ann Liang, when Alice Sun — a type-A, straight-A, overachieving student at an elite international school in Beijing — mysteriously turns cold and disappears. That’s right, she has the power of invisibility on her side. Is it sporadic? Yeah. Largely uncontrollable? Definitely. 

In tandem with her academic weapon status being in jeopardy due to the mounting tuition and limited scholarships, Alice tries to gather the funding to maintain her high-achieving status and finally be enough. Through the power of will, she monetizes her new power by discovering and selling her classmate’s most scandalous secrets. 

Many of Alice’s actions are spurred on by economic struggles. With every id-inspired thought whispering devil-ish encouragement, the external motivation of earning enough money to maintain her spot at her elite international school rings true. “If You Could See the Sun” doesn’t only critique many students’ mindset about ambition and academia; it factors the role privilege and power plays into it, as well. 

Though the comic book-ish nature of the whole invisibility spiel sounds akin to a sweeping fantasy, this magic realism novel tackles much more than dramatic teenager confrontations and invisibility hijinks. While this vaguely supernatural facet of the storytelling may sound wildin’, it is the perfect medium to highlight the extreme nature of these different struggles: academic, socioeconomic, and the lingering sensation of inadequacy. 

As smaller gossip-laden jobs spiral into revenge parties (OK, Janice) and stalking schemes, the lengths that Alice is willing to go to elevate her station get clearer and clearer. The vehicle of invisibility and magic realism allow for an extreme exaggeration of the institutional power that hits hard, but doesn’t hit the reader hard enough over the head to feel concussed. 

The point is: the thematic thread of invisibility (cue the Taylor Swift song), as it presents itself as a metaphor for stifling power structures within academia, is far more prevalent than the manifestation of the translucence-inducing power itself. 

Amid the school-life crisis (Alice is too young for it to be a mid-life crisis), a parallel story to Macbeth holds true. “If You Could See the Sun” might be a story about friendship, social class and academia, but those themes and critiques of society swirl together to create a narrative centralized around ambition. 

When is it too much? What do you really want in life? What makes you happy? When do you stop? When are you more important than a shiny award or some measly vowels strung together in the form of praise? Does it take the absurdity of Alice’s far-fetched business plan snowballing into illegality and hijinks for it all to come crashing down? Or is it a slow, crushing burn that makes you cry as you see fragments of your own thoughts and mentality reflected in Alice? 

For as long as Alice could remember, she has been stuck on cruise control: get up, score high marks, study, neglect her well-being, be no more than a well-oiled machine. At school, she’s known for this one-track mindset (and for being aggressive and shrill, #relatable). 

For Alice, there is a vicious cycle to success — especially success for those not reaping the benefits of the upper class — that she is trapped in. Yes, washing her hair during midterms week is a waste of time: school ID photo be damned. Why would she flush precious hours down the drain by reading or watching movies — non-productive activities — when she has a Chinese essay due? Friends? Fun? Living life? Not important. 

The mindset that Alice is in — “If I’m not swimming as hard as I can, feet thrashing at the waves, I’m drowning” — is a toxic one that too many students engaged in academia subscribe to. Class issues aside, this is textbook burnout. It’s not normal to lose 15 pounds over the course of a semester or neglect budding friendships; destroying yourself over a grade or a position or to be recognized or be the best isn’t fulfillment. 

Validation is such an arbitrary form of currency, yet so many students, Alice and myself included, are willing to go to extreme lengths in order to receive proclamations of, “This is the best paper I’ve ever read” or “Great job, you should be really proud of yourself.”

Congrats. Gold star. But at the end of the day, how can you possibly be proud? Amid the crushing exhaustion, the black hole of joy, the tribulations of other life-ing matters, how are you supposed to see value in something that destroyed you? Great, you’re proud of me, but what about the blood, sweat, tears, mental energy and all-nighters it took to get there? 

I guess they are washed away in the reassuring lull of a few words.  

Ultimately, those words serve as fodder to the fire of achievement: just keep swimming; validation is a chance to fuel up before continuing the long road ahead. The road featuring dazzling high marks, success, acceptance to a highly-ranked university and a bragging-rights worthy career. But how is it not another means to an end? In the blurry haze of trying, trying, trying to be enough, how do you end up being anything more than a well-oiled machine, one that will one day fail and be worthless without the validation and accolades? How do you make it all mean something? To not be invisible? 

That question, and the ache of desire to achieve, is the pulsing vein that runs at the heart of “If You Could See the Sun.” 

It’s the droplets of truth that shines through as Alice buries herself so tremendously in an obsessive project and forgets about her history exam, causing her to full-body panic and break down. It’s the trickle of honest that is impossible to ignore as she constantly has her claws out, ready to turn everything into a competition, unwilling to show a chink in her armor. It’s the flood of emotion as she realizes she needs something she loves, a moment to herself, to recharge, reevaluate and redefine success again. 

And damn, it’s really, really good. 

As Alice keeps pushing, pushing, pushing, she comes to realize that her “dream” of earning money, of being well-liked, of earning perfect 100’s isn’t what she wants from life. With the support of her academic-rival-turned-business-partner-slash-maybe(?)-friend Henry and roommate Chanel (yes, like that Chanel) she is shown the value of cultivating a support system: silent beelines from class to class turn into moments to catch up with Henry; once-awkward exchanges with Chanel turn into gossip seshes or heart-to-hearts. And, like the responsible adult he is, Alice’s English teacher, Mr. Chen, reminds her: “You’re still a kid, you know?” 

Because she is. Alice is just a kid trying to take on the world. But being a kid requires vulnerability, a willingness to make mistakes and learn; it requires people to see the cracks, the ugly in the facade of perfection, the fault lines that tremble and threaten to fall apart at any moment. 

But that’s OK. 

“If You Could See the Sun” reminds us that, yes, it is hard. But within every flaming trainwreck of inadequacy and just trying, there’s always a nugget of joy to be found. Even if it takes some mental breakdowns, or, in Alice’s case, some felonies to get there.  

Maybe there are some days where it would be nifty to have immortality or a frog-like tongue. There’s definitely days, normal days, too, where we feel invisible, superpower or not. But truly, if Alice could just see the Sun — herself — then maybe she could avert her attention to cool time-warp flexibility rather than invisibility. If you could just see you, your goals, your passion, then those adamantium wolf claws wouldn’t mean jack. Finding that knowing within yourself is success? That’s the real superpower.

But let’s be so for real for a minute. That’s far too long-winded and pretentious of an answer to a simple icebreaker question. So for now, I’ll stick with my go-to response: shapeshifting.