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4.25 AVERAGE
4.25 AVERAGE
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
3.5
Truly enjoyable memoir that really pulled me in. But I felt like the ending was rushed and lacking and there were gaps I wanted more explained. Still it was a great read/listen.
Truly enjoyable memoir that really pulled me in. But I felt like the ending was rushed and lacking and there were gaps I wanted more explained. Still it was a great read/listen.
Required reading for every teacher of immigrant children. Required reading for every non-immigrant American. White people know nothing. Nothing.
“I dream of a day when being recognized as human requires no luck—when it is a right, not a privilege. And I dream of a day when each and every one of us will have no reason to fear stepping out of the shadows.”
This is one of those books that stick with you. Young Qian Julie wiggles her way into your heart as she travels across the ocean from the place she calls home.
It's a coming of age tale that shows the struggles, insecurities, and fear that come with starting a life in a new country. This book shows the ways that children adapt to find their place in a new environment but adds on the constant fear that their home will be ripped away from them if a police officer stops them.
I love the voice that Qian Julie uses, she perfectly encapsulates the style of a child, and the narration matures as her younger self grows up. I especially appriciate her depiction of the ways both being an immigrant and being undocumented affect her and her parents daily life.
It's such a compelling tale as we see her father, full of hope and the American Dream, make life-altering plans to bring his family to America, and then follow them through the journey as they learn that reality isn't quite what they expected. I think it's an important mirror that American citizens like me need to hold up to ourselves. She shows us what the American Dream for immigrants actually looks like and it's up to us to choose what to do with that I formation.
I think everyone should read this book; not only is it important but it's also joyful, tragic, and heartwarming.
It's a coming of age tale that shows the struggles, insecurities, and fear that come with starting a life in a new country. This book shows the ways that children adapt to find their place in a new environment but adds on the constant fear that their home will be ripped away from them if a police officer stops them.
I love the voice that Qian Julie uses, she perfectly encapsulates the style of a child, and the narration matures as her younger self grows up. I especially appriciate her depiction of the ways both being an immigrant and being undocumented affect her and her parents daily life.
It's such a compelling tale as we see her father, full of hope and the American Dream, make life-altering plans to bring his family to America, and then follow them through the journey as they learn that reality isn't quite what they expected. I think it's an important mirror that American citizens like me need to hold up to ourselves. She shows us what the American Dream for immigrants actually looks like and it's up to us to choose what to do with that I formation.
I think everyone should read this book; not only is it important but it's also joyful, tragic, and heartwarming.
Qian Julie Wang’s debut memoir Beautiful Country, is about a child who has no hand and no control in an immigration decision, a child who perhaps has no knowledge of that decision, a child whose mother hides an illness for fear of what a doctor's visit will mean for her undocumented family, a child who has no home other than the known neighborhoods of New York. What is to become of this undocumented child as she becomes an adult? Where is home?
Read my complete review at http://www.memoriesfrombooks.com/2022/12/beautiful-country.html
Reviewed for NetGalley.
Read my complete review at http://www.memoriesfrombooks.com/2022/12/beautiful-country.html
Reviewed for NetGalley.
"It was then that I realized I could be homesick for a place even though I no longer knew where home was." -Beautiful Country, Qian Julie Wang
Looking to escape shadow of the oppressive Chinese government looming over their lives, Qian's parents pack up seven-year old Qian and surreptitiously slip away to try for a better life in America. But life in Mei Guo - the "beautiful country" - is not gold paved streets and candy for the Wang family. Ma Ma and Ba Ba - once university professors in China - work demeaning under-the-table jobs in sweatshops, processing plants, and seedy offices; Qian - a happy, healthy, boisterous child in China - becomes withdrawn, hungry, and isolated in school and at home; and what began as a journey for a better life becomes a numb crawl to survive as their small, desperate family comes apart at the seams.
An affecting story of a childhood in the shadow of American poverty, racism, and immigration policy, Wang demonstrates tremendous honesty and vulnerability in detailing her own emotional journey, the transformation of her parents under the pressures of their hidden existence, and the sadnessess, big and small, of being a young girl without resources in New York City. The writing is often beautiful, especially in the final chapters as we reach the full power of Wang's reflection on her own life and trauma. If the entire book had read like the epilogue, I would have been enthralled. Unfortunately, I am just not a fan of the "precocious child narrator", a voice the author often adopts throughout the novel (and, to be fair, she was undeniably a precocious child). The attempts to combine a child's perspective with highly descriptive writing results in the prose feeling a bit stretched thin: a metaphor that doesn't quite land (and then is re-used several times) or an observation that distracts from the narrative to demonstrate what an intelligent child she was. This seems to be an entirely "me" preference, given the (very deserved!) glowing reviews. The emotional impact is undeniable (), and it's an important layer to add to our country's conversation about immigration, poverty, and what we owe the people who are too often kept in the shadows.
Looking to escape shadow of the oppressive Chinese government looming over their lives, Qian's parents pack up seven-year old Qian and surreptitiously slip away to try for a better life in America. But life in Mei Guo - the "beautiful country" - is not gold paved streets and candy for the Wang family. Ma Ma and Ba Ba - once university professors in China - work demeaning under-the-table jobs in sweatshops, processing plants, and seedy offices; Qian - a happy, healthy, boisterous child in China - becomes withdrawn, hungry, and isolated in school and at home; and what began as a journey for a better life becomes a numb crawl to survive as their small, desperate family comes apart at the seams.
An affecting story of a childhood in the shadow of American poverty, racism, and immigration policy, Wang demonstrates tremendous honesty and vulnerability in detailing her own emotional journey, the transformation of her parents under the pressures of their hidden existence, and the sadnessess, big and small, of being a young girl without resources in New York City. The writing is often beautiful, especially in the final chapters as we reach the full power of Wang's reflection on her own life and trauma. If the entire book had read like the epilogue, I would have been enthralled. Unfortunately, I am just not a fan of the "precocious child narrator", a voice the author often adopts throughout the novel (and, to be fair, she was undeniably a precocious child). The attempts to combine a child's perspective with highly descriptive writing results in the prose feeling a bit stretched thin: a metaphor that doesn't quite land (and then is re-used several times) or an observation that distracts from the narrative to demonstrate what an intelligent child she was. This seems to be an entirely "me" preference, given the (very deserved!) glowing reviews. The emotional impact is undeniable (
Spoiler
Marilyn broke my heart
I was a bit distracted by the mandarin- I guess this might be the first time that I’ve read a book with foreign phrases and sentences in a language that I actually understand. One thing I wanted to know more was why her parents decided to come over to America in the first place? I can infer the reasons, but I wish it had been more explicitly stated. Or perhaps the author wanted to keep us in the world of a small child who didn’t understand adult behaviors?
It’s not like I expected this to be uplifting, but the tragedy after tragedy made this a really tough read. Maybe would’ve been better as an essay. I hope this entire family got therapy.
4.5 stars. This was a solid read. Don’t always enjoy books told from a child’s perspective Bc the writing can get superficial. But appreciated a lot of elements in this coming of age in an immigrant family story.