As anti-Chinese prejudice rears its ugly head in the United States, more palpably and consequentially than it has in living memory, it is worth remembering that Chinese have been in America for generations. C Pam Zhang’s debut novel of Chinese immigrants who came for the railroads and the gold rush, How Much of These Hills is Gold, is a haunting tale of family, home, and belonging.
Author: Susan Blumberg-Kason
Francesca Cavallo, best known for her best-selling children’s book, Goodnight Stories for Rebel Girls, has written and released a new, free e-book for children, Dr Li and the Crown-Wearing Virus. The short, 11-page book explains how Wuhan ophthalmologist Dr Li Wenliang first noticed how many of his patients suffered from the severe flu-like symptoms that didn’t resemble any known disease.
At the beginning of Frances Cha’s debut novel, If I Had Your Face, a fierce social commentary about gender roles, class divisions and, yes, plastic surgery in South Korea, Kyuri is seated at her plastic surgeon’s office and spots the K-Pop star whose look she copied for her many surgeries. The K-Pop star looks as if she’d been crying and pulls a cap down over her face when Kyuri peers over at her. When the star is called back into an exam room, the two women lock eyes.
Souvankham Thammavongsa has come a long way from Nong Khai refugee camp in Thailand in which she was born in 1978. Her family, originally from Laos, were able to settle in Canada when she was a year old.
As Asian-American writers are increasingly considered mainstream, populate “best books” and “books to watch” lists, and receive acclaim from both critics and the general public, there has been a rediscovery of works of some of the early pioneers. Louis Chu’s Eat a Bowl of Tea, just re-released by University of Washington Press as part of its Classics of Asian American Literature series, was first published in 1961, re-released in 1979 and adapted for film by Wayne Wang in 1989, also to critical acclaim.
When Lana Lee adds a catering service to her family’s noodle restaurant in the suburbs of Cleveland, Ohio, it’s not what she expected. At a birthday party for family friend Donna Feng, nanny Alice Kam is found dead in the outdoor swimming pool. It’s not an accident, as bruises are found around Alice’s neck and wrists. Lana attended the party as the caterer and heard the scream when a guest discovered Alice’s body floating in the pool.
Perhaps because it transcends language and even thought, there is something about food that both reinforces and crosses culture. Food has been a cultural and emotional touchstone for Nina Mingya Powles since her earliest days.
The world is perhaps changing when translations from Chinese feature as the first volume in a series of just about anything. Two Lines Press, an independent publisher based in San Francisco, has recently launched the Calico Series of translated literature. “Each Calico is a vibrant snapshot that explores one aspect of the present moment, offering the voices of previously inaccessible, highly innovative writers from around the world.” That We May Live is the first in the series and features seven stories in translation from authors in Hong Kong and China.
When Sophie Cairns’s parents announced they were leaving Hong Kong, where she was born and raised, she vowed to return. A teenager, biracial and fluent in Cantonese, she never felt like she belonged in the UK, and longed for the Hong Kong of her childhood.
At first glance, the only thing linking the stories in Rebecca Otowa’s new book, The Mad Kyoto Shoe Swapper, is that they all take place in Japan. Yet although they span 17th-century Edo to the present day, two themes recur in most: women’s hardships and the fears of ageing. It quickly becomes clear how, in Japan at least, these two themes are closely related.
You must be logged in to post a comment.