In this comic novel, we’re introduced to Charles Wang, a Chinese immigrant who has built a large fortune in America only to lose it all in the financial crisis of 2008. Now Charles, along with his high school age daughter, his college age son, and his second wife, sets out on a cross-country drive to get to his oldest daughter’s home across the country. I liked some stuff about this book which is a phrase that also telegraphs that I didn’t like some stuff about it. The book has an absolutely breathless tone and style and for about the first hundred pages, I was just utterly swept up by its manic energy. And some of the characters are interesting, particularly the oldest daughter, Saina, who is an artist struggling to find inspiration after a kind of flash in the pan career as a darling of the art-world; I found basically all of her stuff to be compelling. But after about the first hundred pages, I started to find the fast pace of the book to become rather wearying and while there are laughs to be had here, I started to find the jokes more and more labored as the book went on. I was pretty well checked out for the last thirty to forty pages of the book, just kind of over it and not at all interested in the character the book chose to focus on during that section. The book has an interesting perspective and Chang has a strong and quirky voice. It’s not a terrible book by any means; it’s overall a fine novel, occasionally sparking some real fire and some may find the book’s propulsive energy more exhilarating than I ultimately did. I do have to bring up, however, that there is a distasteful and out-of-place section featuring a sexual assault that is played . . . very lightly. Not exactly for laughs, but it’s certainly not taken seriously and I found that really jarring in an unpleasant way. Buyer beware in that case, though it didn’t ruin the book for me. 3 stars.
tl;dr – dysfunctional Chinese family takes a road trip in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis; breathless pace and some good characters, but it loses focus by the end. 3 stars.