A review by jackiehwang
Beautiful Country by Qian Julie Wang

4.0

Beautiful book and beautiful writing. Wang tells the story of her childhood in great detail, somehow conveying with such vivid and detailed memory a painful and resilient childhood. What most particularly stood out to me was the way she conveyed the relationships she has with her parents: the impact they've made on her, the sacrifices they've made for her, and the immense love they have for her--elements of life that remind me of my own parents and how infinitely blessed I am to have them. Perhaps another dimension of her story I also related to were parts of her Asian American upbringing: the food she enjoyed, parts of American culture she reveled at quest to find her own identity and belonging. Reading this book after having lived outside of my home country for a couple years also made me think about the American identity and immigrant experience--what does it mean to belong to a place, to call it home?

While I've had a very different life, reading her book made me appreciate parts of my own upbringing, and that feeling is quite priceless. Growing up in a low-income household, Wang beautifully conveys the appreciation she experienced for the small moments in life, something I think everyone can strive for. Wang is a gifted writer and has the ability to convey such precise feelings, reactions, thoughts in her story.