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A review by jkeel97
American Panda by Gloria Chao
3.0
American Panda was an impulse buy when I was ordering a large selection of other recently published young adult books. However, it was the first one I read when they all arrived. I think it was because I had not heard a lot of buzz about this book which made me curious.
This book is part of the new amazing wave of diverse authors and stories in YA and it presented the story of a 17-year-old Taiwanese American girl at MIT and her struggle with her parent's cultural expectations and her own dreams. The book was a slow start to me, but as I went on I engaged more and more with the funny yet emotional core of the novel's voice. This was a girl who is pre-med but also a germaphobe, who loves to dance but is also socially awkward.
The main character Mei was so endearing and yet so funny that it was easy to root for her. I loved the portrayal of the complex relationship she had with her family, the competing emotions of loyalty and love but the craving for freedom. The relationship with her mother was specifically well done. Her mother could have easily been just a one-dimensional antagonistic character, but she had also had a lot of humor and complex motivations that won me over to her.
Some of the other relationships felt more rushed and not fully developed to me. For instance, her roommate just seemed thrown into the picture at the end and I would have liked to see their relationship developed more throughout.
Another one of my favorite parts of the book was the way Chinese culture was worked into the narrative. It was done in a way that did not feel overtly educational, but at the same time did not make the references fully inaccessible to non-Chinese readers. That is a hard balance to strike. The use of Mandarin throughout the book was integrated well and represented the larger combination of American and Chinese culture that the main character embodies.
Overall, I was surprised in the end how much I enjoyed this book because at the start it felt just a tad too cliche and the pacing a bit off. But really the characters sucked me in and the book passed by quickly. The best part about the book was the feeling that the author had felt a lot of these emotions first hand and she even has a special thank you to her own mother in the acknowledgments. And I can definitely say I will pick up whatever book Gloria Chao decides to write next.
This book is part of the new amazing wave of diverse authors and stories in YA and it presented the story of a 17-year-old Taiwanese American girl at MIT and her struggle with her parent's cultural expectations and her own dreams. The book was a slow start to me, but as I went on I engaged more and more with the funny yet emotional core of the novel's voice. This was a girl who is pre-med but also a germaphobe, who loves to dance but is also socially awkward.
The main character Mei was so endearing and yet so funny that it was easy to root for her. I loved the portrayal of the complex relationship she had with her family, the competing emotions of loyalty and love but the craving for freedom. The relationship with her mother was specifically well done. Her mother could have easily been just a one-dimensional antagonistic character, but she had also had a lot of humor and complex motivations that won me over to her.
Some of the other relationships felt more rushed and not fully developed to me. For instance, her roommate just seemed thrown into the picture at the end and I would have liked to see their relationship developed more throughout.
Another one of my favorite parts of the book was the way Chinese culture was worked into the narrative. It was done in a way that did not feel overtly educational, but at the same time did not make the references fully inaccessible to non-Chinese readers. That is a hard balance to strike. The use of Mandarin throughout the book was integrated well and represented the larger combination of American and Chinese culture that the main character embodies.
Overall, I was surprised in the end how much I enjoyed this book because at the start it felt just a tad too cliche and the pacing a bit off. But really the characters sucked me in and the book passed by quickly. The best part about the book was the feeling that the author had felt a lot of these emotions first hand and she even has a special thank you to her own mother in the acknowledgments. And I can definitely say I will pick up whatever book Gloria Chao decides to write next.