The Wangs vs. The World by Jade Chang – 368 pages
Book Blurb:
Charles Wang is mad at America. A brash, lovable immigrant businessman who built a cosmetics empire and made a fortune, he’s just been ruined by the financial crisis. Now all Charles wants is to get his kids safely stowed away so that he can go to China and attempt to reclaim his family’s ancestral lands—and his pride. Charles pulls Andrew, his aspiring comedian son, and Grace, his style-obsessed daughter, out of schools he can no longer afford. Together with their stepmother, Barbra, they embark on a cross-country road trip from their foreclosed Bel-Air home to the upstate New York hideout of the eldest daughter, disgraced art world it-girl Saina. But with his son waylaid by a temptress in New Orleans, his wife ready to defect for a set of 1,000-thread-count sheets, and an epic smash-up in North Carolina, Charles may have to choose between the old world and the new, between keeping his family intact and finally fulfilling his dream of starting anew in China.
My Review: 3 stars
The Wangs vs. The World was an interesting look at the American Dream gone good and then suddenly bad. The author has a quick wit, which drew me in straight away. After about fifty pages in the humor became rote and slightly tiresome but still added to the storyline.
I found the plot to be a unique one as usually these stories are of the American Dream success OR failure. The idea that this had the rise and fall was one I hadn’t explored in fiction. For me, the problem was that I didn’t care enough about any of the characters. I just found them flat, selfish and unmoored.
The continual name-dropping of celebrities and brands upon brands also became repetitive. Again, throughout all the things I disliked about the book, I did enjoy the humor the author provided which kept me plowing along.
Perhaps I was too excited to read this book with all the promises and expectations of it in my head. It’s not a bad book, just didn’t reach the potential I’d anticipated.
Quotes I liked:
Was it possible to love someone and hate them at the same time? Or to love some someone even if you didn’t actually like them?”
-“She stayed silent, no longer even surprised at what he could say. Or maybe his advanced degree of fuckery could still surprise her.”
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Happy New Year, Lauren! A suggestion re: book about immigrants – I LOVED Re:Jane by Patricia Park. Here’s my review: I’m always pretty lame when it comes to books that parallel/modernize other and older books/plays, so any Jane Eyre references in this excellent book blew right by me. But it’s a great story standing on its own, of making a place where there isn’t one set for you. Jane is half American, half Korean, and lives with her uncle and aunt in Flushing, Queens, where they runs a produce store and pressure Jane to achieve every goal that such elders have for their progeny – Ivy league, lawyer or doctor, marriage to someone with “prospects”. Jane heads in different directions – to an au pair job in Brooklyn, to Korea, and back to the US.
Her journey is so confusing, so contradictory, so difficult – that although her background may be unusual to the reader, her reactions and decisions are not. I loved being introduced to two Korean expressions – tap-tap-hae and nunchi – that I am considering adding them to my vocabulary as a tribute to Patricia Park and her brilliant debut novel.
thanks for the recommendation Eileen!