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roopoopoo's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
5.0
internationalreads's review against another edition
This just wasn’t pulling me in at the moment. It didn’t feel like anything new that I hadn’t read before. It may just be a “it’s not you, it’s me” thing.
loriluo's review against another edition
4.0
As an Asian American woman similar in age to author Julia Lee, reading this book felt strangely cathartic. There's a lot packed into this deceptively short work, as it merges the boundaries between memoir, racial commentary, and race studies as a whole.
Julia Lee grew up in an area in LA that was predominantly Black; as the child of Korean immigrants, she watched as her parents struggled to raise her and her sister in a foreign country, all while realizing that the ways she was different from her peers and neighbors were innumerable, and many more than skin-deep. She herself that she was complicit in the dogma that many Asian families follow - work hard, keep your head down, go to a good (Ivy League) college, and be happy.
But... is that it? Julia looks back on her childhood, noting the the classicism she saw even as a child between races, the way money was the largest delimiter. She raises the looming issue of mental health, how poorly addressed and recognized it is in the Asian American community, and the underlying anxiety and depression that many struggle with. When discussing the simultaneous demeaning and fetishization of Asian women, she doesn't shy away from calling out the sheer absurdity of the situation. She also calls out her own flaws and misgivings, noting how her own generational trauma has been passed down to her daughter, something she tried her best to avoid doing. Despite being part of the "model minority" that has benefitted in the racial structure in America, Lee argues that it's not right to simply be silent - it's time to bite the hand that feeds us.
Growing up in a similar environment, there was so much in Lee's writing that rang true to me - and the issues and questions she raises are ones that need to be addressed at large.
Thank you Henry Holt and Co. for the advance copy of this novel!
Julia Lee grew up in an area in LA that was predominantly Black; as the child of Korean immigrants, she watched as her parents struggled to raise her and her sister in a foreign country, all while realizing that the ways she was different from her peers and neighbors were innumerable, and many more than skin-deep. She herself that she was complicit in the dogma that many Asian families follow - work hard, keep your head down, go to a good (Ivy League) college, and be happy.
But... is that it? Julia looks back on her childhood, noting the the classicism she saw even as a child between races, the way money was the largest delimiter. She raises the looming issue of mental health, how poorly addressed and recognized it is in the Asian American community, and the underlying anxiety and depression that many struggle with. When discussing the simultaneous demeaning and fetishization of Asian women, she doesn't shy away from calling out the sheer absurdity of the situation. She also calls out her own flaws and misgivings, noting how her own generational trauma has been passed down to her daughter, something she tried her best to avoid doing. Despite being part of the "model minority" that has benefitted in the racial structure in America, Lee argues that it's not right to simply be silent - it's time to bite the hand that feeds us.
Growing up in a similar environment, there was so much in Lee's writing that rang true to me - and the issues and questions she raises are ones that need to be addressed at large.
Thank you Henry Holt and Co. for the advance copy of this novel!
jwolflink3's review against another edition
emotional
tense
medium-paced
Very proud of its call to “think beyond,” but it only gestures at an attempt to actually do so, with an isolated, fetishizing chapter lauding its deracinated understanding of Native North American worldviews.
aligroovi's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
4.75
handful_of_frogs's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
informative
tense
medium-paced
4.5
runningjenw's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
3.75