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marie_gg's review
4.0
http://mariesbookgarden.blogspot.com/2011/10/midngiht-at-dragon-cafe-chinese-girl-in.html
As a small child, Su-Jen arrives in a small town outside of Toronto to live with her father, whom she has never met. She and her mother have immigrated from Hong Kong, much to her mother's dismay. Su-Jen (or Annie, her Canadian name) feels completely caught between cultures as the only Chinese child in her small town in the 1960s (her parents run the one Chinese restaurant). She's constantly walking the fine line between being a good Chinese girl and growing up as a Canadian.
Bates based her story on her own life experience...she too came to Canada as a girl. As she drove through Canadian small towns, she couldn't help but wonder what life would be like as the only Chinese family in town.
When Su-Jen's brother comes to stay, the family's staid but settled life gets thrown into disarray. Her mother's deep unhappiness comes to light, in addition to her father's willingness (and the Chinese cultural approach) to overlook unpleasant things to maintain peace and face.
Bates beautifully describes the life of an immigrant child who is always caught in the middle, feeling as if she never fits in anywhere. She desperately wants to try out for the lead role in a school play until one of her friends tells her that a Chinese person would never get the lead role. She opts to be in the chorus instead of trying out.
Su-Jen's mother is a woman trapped by her beauty, bitterness, and lack of choices. A woman with a child in the 1960s--either Chinese or from another country--did not have many options beyond finding a man to take care of her. Stories about people feeling trapped in their lives, deeply unfilled and unhappy, make me sad.
Ultimately, the secrets fall out, as they always do. Su-Jen realizes that secrets can cause anguish and pain, but so can revealing them.
As a small child, Su-Jen arrives in a small town outside of Toronto to live with her father, whom she has never met. She and her mother have immigrated from Hong Kong, much to her mother's dismay. Su-Jen (or Annie, her Canadian name) feels completely caught between cultures as the only Chinese child in her small town in the 1960s (her parents run the one Chinese restaurant). She's constantly walking the fine line between being a good Chinese girl and growing up as a Canadian.
Bates based her story on her own life experience...she too came to Canada as a girl. As she drove through Canadian small towns, she couldn't help but wonder what life would be like as the only Chinese family in town.
When Su-Jen's brother comes to stay, the family's staid but settled life gets thrown into disarray. Her mother's deep unhappiness comes to light, in addition to her father's willingness (and the Chinese cultural approach) to overlook unpleasant things to maintain peace and face.
Bates beautifully describes the life of an immigrant child who is always caught in the middle, feeling as if she never fits in anywhere. She desperately wants to try out for the lead role in a school play until one of her friends tells her that a Chinese person would never get the lead role. She opts to be in the chorus instead of trying out.
Su-Jen's mother is a woman trapped by her beauty, bitterness, and lack of choices. A woman with a child in the 1960s--either Chinese or from another country--did not have many options beyond finding a man to take care of her. Stories about people feeling trapped in their lives, deeply unfilled and unhappy, make me sad.
Ultimately, the secrets fall out, as they always do. Su-Jen realizes that secrets can cause anguish and pain, but so can revealing them.
sewerhill's review
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
misssusan's review
3.0
Follows Su-Jen, the daughter of an immigrant family, from 6 to 12 years old. It's a family focused tale with all the internal drama they usually have. It reminds me a little of The Lovely Bones if the catalyst material was immigration instead of a daughter's murder. Quietly absorbing. I didn't have any strong feelings reading this but I also didn't want to put it down. 3.5 stars
soliteyah's review
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
the_bookish_musings_of_mari's review
5.0
I read this in 2005 or 2006 in University and loved it. It was then that I was introduced to diasporas. I have re-read this in one day now to refresh my memory for book club next week. So much of Su-Jen’s experience is like my own as a child immigrant. It’s raw and a little unsettling - but a story that I am glad has been told.
adornhoe's review
5.0
"I should be grateful, but at the same time it seemed that everything rested on me, that all the good things in my life and future seemed to be built on not just someone’s efforts but someone’s sacrifice, someone’s misfortunes."
This is a quiet, calm, and heartbreaking novel. While the first-person narrator is looking back at her childhood, understanding things that were mysterious to her then, this adult point of view never overshadows Su-Jen’s childish outlook. There is so much she cannot understand yet, about the subtle dynamics in her own family, about her friends and their parents. Thus, her narration can only hint at some of the topics in this books but this only made the way the events are told all the more intense and impressive to me. In a way, being dramatic and adding hyperbole and hyperbole is as easy at it is cheap. I do not claim there is no place for this in literature – I am, after all, a big fan of horror and Gothic writing – but the held back way in which Su-Jen, the adult, presents the incisive events of her childhood without extensive explanations or judgement was, for me, the central element that shaped my reading experience.
At its heart, this novel is about loneliness. Su-Jen, her parents, and, later, her half-brother live in close quarters that should leave no room for privacy, not to speak of secrets. Their physical closeness notwithstanding, each of these characters carries their own loneliness, their own grief, their own bitterness. This is not a family that talks about emotions, be they good or bad, and all the things that are not being spoken of trickle like a poison into everyday life. The secrecy, sadness, and resentment form a steady background noise that makes the moments of genuine love and connection all the more striking.
Su-Jen is in a difficult position. In contrast to her parents, who only speak broken English, she is completely fluent, and in contrast to her brother, she is not expected to take over the family restaurant. This gives her life an element of freedom that the rest of her family does not experience. On the other hand, though, as the youngest, who has, at some point, basically forgotten her early childhood in Hong Kong, she is removed from the family history and only slowly and partly uncovers the stories of her parents‘ lives. She feels Canadian, but for many of her classmates she always stays „that Chinese girl.“
Midnight at the Dragon Café is a novel that, no matter its heavy subject matters, never felt like a chore to read. Judy Fong Bates creates an atmosphere that is often melancholic and resigned, yes, but nevertheless evokes a sense of homeliness and I loved returning to this Ontario small town in the 60s again and again.
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This is a quiet, calm, and heartbreaking novel. While the first-person narrator is looking back at her childhood, understanding things that were mysterious to her then, this adult point of view never overshadows Su-Jen’s childish outlook. There is so much she cannot understand yet, about the subtle dynamics in her own family, about her friends and their parents. Thus, her narration can only hint at some of the topics in this books but this only made the way the events are told all the more intense and impressive to me. In a way, being dramatic and adding hyperbole and hyperbole is as easy at it is cheap. I do not claim there is no place for this in literature – I am, after all, a big fan of horror and Gothic writing – but the held back way in which Su-Jen, the adult, presents the incisive events of her childhood without extensive explanations or judgement was, for me, the central element that shaped my reading experience.
At its heart, this novel is about loneliness. Su-Jen, her parents, and, later, her half-brother live in close quarters that should leave no room for privacy, not to speak of secrets. Their physical closeness notwithstanding, each of these characters carries their own loneliness, their own grief, their own bitterness. This is not a family that talks about emotions, be they good or bad, and all the things that are not being spoken of trickle like a poison into everyday life. The secrecy, sadness, and resentment form a steady background noise that makes the moments of genuine love and connection all the more striking.
Su-Jen is in a difficult position. In contrast to her parents, who only speak broken English, she is completely fluent, and in contrast to her brother, she is not expected to take over the family restaurant. This gives her life an element of freedom that the rest of her family does not experience. On the other hand, though, as the youngest, who has, at some point, basically forgotten her early childhood in Hong Kong, she is removed from the family history and only slowly and partly uncovers the stories of her parents‘ lives. She feels Canadian, but for many of her classmates she always stays „that Chinese girl.“
Midnight at the Dragon Café is a novel that, no matter its heavy subject matters, never felt like a chore to read. Judy Fong Bates creates an atmosphere that is often melancholic and resigned, yes, but nevertheless evokes a sense of homeliness and I loved returning to this Ontario small town in the 60s again and again.
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niceread's review
3.0
Interesting immigrant story from a Canadian vantage point. The narrator is a child. I like novels with a child narrator because they describe what is happening with such a fresh and innocent perspective.
emilydoucette's review
emotional
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75