Catalina by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio

June 19, 2025

Catalina by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio

Catalina is a senior at Harvard, an aspiring writer who has worked a variety of unpaid internships, trying to figure out where she belongs. Born in Ecuador, she was sent to the United States to live with her grandparents following the death of her parents. Searching for love and romance, Catalina harbors a secret that can impact her future.

DNF at 51% - this was all over the place. It was like the author had a bunch of different stories that she just lumped together into one long stream of consciousness piece with no real plot or storyline, just a "year in the life." Did not care for the main character - extremely self-focused with no character growth, immature and pretentious at the same time. Actually, I didn't care for any of the characters. FYI, this is NOT dark academia - dark academia is Donna Tartt's The Secret History and others like it. The subject matter is important (the experiences of the undocumented living in the U.S., South American history and culture) so it's unfortunate that I found it so unreadable. Fans of the style of Sally Rooney or Dolly Alderton will probably enjoy it.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an eARC for review.

Ecuador

Cinema Love by Jiaming Tang

January 16, 2024

Cinema Love by Jiaming Tang

After he was caught with another man, Old Second left his village in rural China and went to Mawei City to work at the clothing factories. At the local workers' cinema, he found other men like him, and he also met Bao Mei, who worked at the cinema selling tickets. But being gay is illegal in communist China, so as the oppression grows, Old Second marries Bao Mei and they leave China for the United States. They settle into New York's Chinatown and find a community of men like Old Second, gay men who have married women to provide a cover story for themselves and hide in plain sight.

A complex story that revolves around a set of inter-connected characters, each with their own story and shared emotions: grief, loneliness, shame, sadness, desire. There is a lot to absorb here: the shame and oppression that gay men are subjected to in both China and the United States; the loveless marriages that their wives tolerate; emigrating to the U. S. and living in poverty while trying to survive and stay under the radar. A difficult story to read but wonderful writing and language.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an eARC for review.

New York's Chinatown

The House of Lincoln by Nancy Horan

May 10, 2023

The House of Lincoln by Nancy Horan

Follows the lives of three families living in Springfield, IL, from the mid-19th century to the early 20th century, and their different experiences. The Lincolns are Abraham Lincoln's family; the Donnegans are a free black family who assist escaped slaves to freedom; and the Ferreiras are a family of Portuguese immigrants who left their home seeking religious freedom and settled in Springfield. All are affected by Lincoln's presidency and assassination, the Civil War, and emancipation and restoration following the war. 

I enjoyed Horan's previous books so I was looking forward to reading her latest novel. While well-researched, the author tried to cover too much territory historically, and there are too many characters for good character development. She tried to include too many important topics, such as slavery, the Civil War, Lincoln's presidency, the race riots in the early 20th century, Mary Todd Lincoln's life as First Lady. I think the title is also incorrect - I went into the book thinking it was about the Lincoln family, but they really play only a small part. There is much more about the Donnegan family and slavery than either of the other families. Needed a good editor - disappointing.

Many thanks to Edelweiss and the publisher for providing an eARC for review.

Springfield's main street and business district, mid-19th century

Fatty Fatty Boom Boom by Rabia Chaudry

February 6, 2023

Fatty Fatty Boom Boom by Rabia Chaudry

Born into a Pakistani family that emigrated to the U.S., Rabia Chaudry has had a lifelong battle with her weight. Raised on the carb-heavy American diet and with family genetics that tend toward being overweight, Rabia struggled with her weight all her life, viewing her body with self-loathing. Because of her weight, her Pakistani family obsessed that she would never marry, but she married before she finished college. Three pregnancies over the next 20 years didn't help her weight issues. She tried many diets and extreme exercise programs, and even had weight loss surgery. Everything she did was moderately successful, but the weight always came back. This is her account of her journey and eventual acceptance that she is never going to look like Beyonce (just like I'm never going to look like Heidi Klum). There are traditional Pakistani recipes at the end of the book that sound wonderful.

I first learned about Rabia while listening to the podcast Serial, about the Adnan Syed case. Syed was the best friend of Rabia's brother, and she has known him since he was a child. Although her parents wanted her to become a doctor, Rabia went to law school instead and ended up working on immigration issues and cases of wrongful conviction.

Rabia Chaudry

Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara

August 30, 2022

Clark and Division by Naomi Hirahara

American-born Aki and her sister Rose are Nissei, the children of Japanese immigrants. Aki's father runs a successful produce business in a Los Angeles suburb. Aki has always lived in California, until the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor. The family soon finds themselves in Manzanar concentration camp out in the middle of nowhere.

When the government offers relocation to cities in the center of the country, the family jumps at the chance to move to Chicago, where there is work and housing available. Aki's older sister Rose works for the camp administration and is allowed to go on ahead of the rest of the family. But shortly before the rest of the family arrive in Chicago, Rose is killed in a subway accident. Her death is ruled a suicide by the coroner. Aki is certain that her sister would never have killed herself and is determined to find out what caused her death.

Chicago 1944

This is Hirahara's first historical novel and it's not as good as her mystery series. It is a fascinating look at life for Japanese Americans during World War II. Lots of descriptions about Chicago, although there is a little too much about traveling around the city. Some of the more interesting characters (like a drag queen Aki meets at the hair salon) are unfortunately not explored and in fact, have nothing to do with the plot. Not the author's best effort.

Manzanar Camp

Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu

February 3, 2020

Today is National Golden Retriever Day!  Go hug a golden (or any dog)!

My Luke

Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu

Willis Wu works as an extra in a TV police drama called Black and White, as Generic Asian Man.  Even in his personal life, he sees himself as Generic Asian Man.  His career goal is to become Kung Fu Guy, which he considers to be the pinnacle for an Asian actor.  He lives in the SRO (single room occupancy) housing above the Golden Palace Chinese restaurant along with other Asian Americans who are bit players for the TV show, since many of the scenes are filmed at the restaurant.  Willis works in the restaurant when he needs to (such as the times when his character “dies” and he can’t work on the show for 45 days).  Inside his head, Willis lives in an interior Chinatown:  although he is American-born and educated, he can’t seem to find his place in the world, except against a Chinatown backdrop, and he sees himself and the Asian Americans around him as stereotypes that America has cast for them (such as Old Asian Man or Restaurant Hostess).

The plot blends the storyline of a television drama with Willis’ life, written in a script-like format with a Courier font that mimics an old-fashioned typewriter, and eventually the two storylines get tangled into a single jumble.  The narrative style forces the reader to look at stereotypes both “on” and “off” screen and consider the stereotypes in our own lives and how we see others.  Should appeal to readers who enjoy Dave Eggers or Paul Beatty.

(When we were kids, there was a TV program for a few seasons called Kung Fu – I think the whole Carradine family acted in the show.  The main character was a half-Chinese monk being played by a white guy.  My brothers didn’t care much about the story line but really got into the martial arts fighting.  My youngest brother convinced my mother to buy him a kimono style robe, and he would leap out of his bedroom wearing it, give a kung fu yell, and kick-box his way down the hall.  Just a fond memory, grasshopper.)

Severance by Ling Ma

November 26, 2019

Severance by Ling Ma

Candace Chen is an office worker at a publishing company in Manhattan when Shen Fever hits, an epidemic that turns people into non-violent zombies doomed to repeat the same mindless tasks over and over.  As the number of people dwindle, she begins recording photographs of Manhattan in a blog she calls NY Ghost.  When she finally is forced to leave Manhattan, she joins a group of eight other survivors, led by an ex-IT guy named Bob who claims to know of the perfect place for them to regroup and start civilization over.  The place turns out to be an abandoned shopping mall outside Chicago they refer to as The Facility (aka Deer Oaks Mall, probably based on Woodfield Mall in Schaumburg).  When her fellow survivors learn that Candace is pregnant, they elect to hold her prisoner until her baby is born.  Candace fears what their actions mean for her unborn baby and is determined to escape.

Based on the description I wrote above, this should have been a more exciting story than it turned out to be.  There are parallels between the infected zombies’ repetitive actions and Candace’s repetitive tasks at work, her mother’s early onset Alzheimer’s, and the factory workers’ jobs in China.  There is lots of filler about Candace’s life when she first came to New York, also about her jerk boyfriends and co-workers.  While it reminded me at times of Station Eleven, it’s basically the millennials’ search for meaning other than mindless consumerism.  Unfortunately Candace, her friends, and the other survivors are all pretty boring.  Maybe I would have connected more with the characters if I was a millennial.  I listened to the audio version and I found myself skipping ahead through some of the boring parts.

Searching for Sylvie Lee by Jean Kwok

September 12, 2019

Searching for Sylvie Lee by Jean Kwok

After her sister Sylvie goes missing, Amy questions family and friends to see if anyone knows where she is.  Although Amy has never been out of the state of New York, she travels to the Netherlands, Sylvie's last known location.  As her search continues, Amy begins to wonder if she really knows her sister at all.

I love me a domestic drama with lots of family secrets, also missing person stories, and even more, I love one told from various points of view.  This one ticked those boxes for me, but I still found the story disappointing.  I didn't like most of the characters because they weren't that well-developed or unique - the male characters were all creepy, and except for Grandma, the women characters were all shallow (Amy's first thought when she hears Sylvie is missing is who is going to pay off her student loans now).  There is drama and there are plot twists, but none of them were surprising or new.  Although it's described as a mystery, there's not a lot about it that's mysterious, and there are enough hints for the reader to catch on pretty quick about Sylvie's whereabouts.  I hope there is more plot and better characters in Kwok's next book.

The Best Polish Restaurant in Buffalo by William Kowalski

August 3, 2019

The Best Polish Restaurant in Buffalo by William Kowalski

It’s August, and I needed something a little lighter to read.  This isn't high literature but it's a pleasant read, a family saga based loosely on the author's great-grandmother's life.  Aniela is a Polish farm girl who emigrates to the United States with her mother and sisters, to escape from her brutal father and brothers.  The exact type of abuse isn't stated, but there is a hint of sexual and physical abuse in addition to the women being treated like slaves.  Despite how hard she worked, Aniela loved her life in her small Polish town.  Her mother decides that they will settle in Buffalo, New York, since there is a large Polish community, and it's also smaller and less intimidating that Chicago, the other American city with a large Polish population.

Arriving in Buffalo, the four women find jobs through the Polish community, working hard to create a new life for themselves.  They are employed as house cleaners and laundresses, learning English, finding a place in their new community.  The work is hard, but they all worked hard in Poland, and they are paid fairly for their work and able to save for a house.

Their mother's most important possession is a crock of sourdough starter that she brings with her from Poland.  Aniela and her sisters continue to use and feed the starter, eventually starting their own bakery where they sell authentic Polish sourdough bread and rolls.  The bakery morphs into a famous Polish restaurant that supports the family for decades, until it fails and has to be sold, due to changes in the city's population, and food trends and tastes.

Although the story was interesting, it was disappointing in parts.  The author doesn't describe how the sisters' little bakery evolves into a restaurant (it would have been more interesting to hear about how the restaurant started and flourished through the years, rather than detailing Iggy's wife's sordid affair).  At the end of the book, the story just sort of stops, with Iggy's life in shambles:  the restaurant closes and his livelihood is gone; he is going to have to split the proceeds from the sale of the restaurant with his many cousins; he and his wife have split up and he has moved out.  There is a glimmer of hope that he will be able to start over, since the original sourdough starter has survived all these years, and so will Iggy.