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About the author and blogger ...

Anne Goodwin’s drive to understand what makes people tick led to a career in clinical psychology. That same curiosity now powers her fiction.
A prize-winning short-story writer, she has published three novels and a short story collection with small independent press, Inspired Quill. Her debut novel, Sugar and Snails, was shortlisted for the 2016 Polari First Book Prize.
Away from her desk, Anne guides book-loving walkers through the Derbyshire landscape that inspired Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre.
Subscribers to her newsletter can download a free e-book of award-winning short stories.

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150 years of Chinese-Americans: The Fortunes by Peter Ho Davies

6/12/2016

11 Comments

 
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When I was growing up, it was said that every fourth child was Chinese. As the fourth child of a white working-class Catholic family, I saw no contradiction in applying that logic to myself. I don’t remember how and when I was disabused of this notion, but I imagine being disappointed. Although probably too young to have a concept of Chinese identity (I think it was prior to my family frequenting Chinese restaurants), the idea of being different made perfect sense. Perhaps that’s what attracts me to reading and writing about diversity, but the Chinese are still relatively unrepresented in my fictional world (Everything I Never Told You an exceptional exception). So, having enjoyed his debut, The Welsh Girl, I looked forward to having my horizons widened by Peter Ho Davies’ new novel about Chinese-American identity, courtesy of Sceptre Books.

Spanning 150 years from the 1860s to the present, the novel dips into the lives of four characters of Chinese heritage who have shaped and been shaped by American history. Ah Ling, the son of a sex worker and one of her wealthy white clients, is shipped from the Pearl River in southern China to California where he hopes to strike gold. Instead, he works in a laundry before becoming the manservant to the tycoon Charles Crocker, who relies upon Chinese labour for the construction of the Central Pacific Railroad. Anna May Wong is Hollywood’s first Chinese movie star, cast as a temptress yet forbidden to kiss a white man on screen and rejected for the lead role in an adaptation of Pearl S Buck’s The Good Earth in favour of and non-Asian actress in “yellowface”. The novel also takes us into the mind of an unnamed man whose life has been defined by the murder of his friend, Vincent Chin, in 1982 Detroit, in a racist attack in which he’s mistaken for Japanese.

While I enjoyed these stories based on real historical figures, with repeated themes of exploitation and exile, adoptees and orphans, and names and details (railways, laundries and sex work in particular) echoing across the decades, it didn’t come together for me as a novel until the contemporary strand. Here, an American writer, John Ling Smith, and his wife, Nola, complete the circle by coming to China to adopt a baby girl. Insomniac, ambivalent about becoming a father and suspicious of the motivations of his fellow adoptive parents, John is disorientated by the experience of looking like the locals but feeling estranged from both their language and outlook. Growing up, he’s felt constrained by a (p226):

list of things you couldn’t do if you were Asian-American: play ping-pong, play piano, wear glasses … wear a camera round your neck, ride a bike, drive an import, grow a moustache (or, if female, streak your hair)

which leaves him with a
fragile, even false, sense of self so that, even though he’s in his thirties, his is very much a coming-of-age story.

As the narrative deepens, it’s clear that the evolution of Chinese-American identity is entwined with the evolution of white racism. Perhaps presaging the current sociopolitical climate, in which
long dormant attitudes have been reignited, John is sceptical of the (p231):

whole “culture” thing … [as] a defence against racism, an anticipation of it, but also perhaps in some obscure way a perpetuation of it.

Many novels (including
my own debut) explore conflicts of identity, but I found The Fortunes especially strong in showing how it’s forged from an interaction between inside and outside. And, while external forces might impact more strongly on some than on others, we all have a degree of choice over how much we internalise mainstream perceptions of who we are. So thanks Peter Ho Davies for extending my thinking in these areas and, I hope he’ll forgive me for reclaiming my fourth child’s portion of being Chinese.

By sheer serendipity, I’d started reading this novel the night before I picked up the
latest Carrot Ranch flash fiction challenge. The theme of “not allowed” is a perfect fit for a novel about fitting in (or not). I considered staying with the theme of identity but my muse took my 99 words in a different direction:

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Even in fiction

From their very first meeting he’d set her spine atingle. Now, as he confessed his desire, her juices pooled in her pants. For weeks she’d suppressed her own yearning, averting her gaze from his groin. Slowly, she rose from her seat and turned the key in the door. Swapping professionalism for passion, she pounced on the couch, and cradled his crotch.

With a sigh, Anne highlighted the paragraph and pressed delete. It wasn’t only the threat of being nominated for the Bad Sex Award. Even in fiction, therapists aren’t allowed to have sex with their clients.


Uncharacteristic of me to interpret the prompt in a positive way but, of course, you can detect my irritation with
authors who push their fictional therapists across the boundaries. If there’s any risk of you joining them, you might find a counterargument in my review of In Therapy.

Thanks for reading. I'd love to know what you think. If you've enjoyed this post, you might like to sign up via the sidebar for regular email updates and/or my quarterly Newsletter.
11 Comments
Jeanne Lombardo link
6/12/2016 02:58:10 pm

Great review Anne. Made me think of a spell I went through about 20 years ago when I discovered Amy Tan. Also read the amazing if devastating Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China by Jung Chang, which chronicles the journeys of a grandmother (concubine under the last emperor), mother (loyal comrade in Mao's Red Army) and daughter, the author (who was raised during the Cultural Revolution and emigrated to England). These books and others were a real eye-opener. And Davies' book sounds like a good addition to those by Tan and Maxine Hong Kingston, for example, in understanding the alienating otherness and generational ruptures experienced by immigrants.
Then of course, there is your excellent flash. What a sly wit you have. Made me laugh. Good broadside against those maddeningly unethical fictional therapists... and against those who dare but fail at sex writing!

Reply
Annecdotist
7/12/2016 09:22:45 am

Thanks for flagging those novels, Jeanne. I think it might be testament to the invisibility of Chinese writers that I’ve read all of these authors, and even have a space on my bookshelves set aside for them, but completely overlooked them when writing this post! In my defence, my focus was on novels I’ve reviewed, but still … Especially pleased to be reminded of Maxine Hong Kingston, perhaps the first Chinese heritage officer I read.
I’m glad the flash made you laugh. I’m still not very confident about writing humour so I’m lapping up the compliment about the sly wit. Thanks for visiting and sharing your thoughts.

Reply
Charli Mills
6/12/2016 10:10:10 pm

Your flash has me howling with laughter! My first thought was how it seemed a departure from your fiction because I know you don't write romance. But I also know you to be a versatile writer and I thought perhaps you had found some inspiration from the theme of sex work in Davies' book. Then to see yourself inserted into the flash with an expression of why you don't write such things was brilliant! I think those of us who avidly read you, will get the biggest kick out of it! Certainly it will amuse any reader.

As to the book review, Chinese Americans have suffered silently with generational intolerance. To read the list of what was not allowed (especial the camera around one's neck) brought home how stereotyped our Chinese American culture is. Yet undaunted! I also know of histories in which many overcame their unfair circumstances. One of my favorite modern western characters (alas from from television, but still great screen-writing) is Wu from "Deadwood." Before we left north Idaho, a local was going to show me where the Chinese cemetery is located. Few know its location and as you know, I love digging into cemeteries (the history, that is).

Reply
Annecdotist
7/12/2016 09:27:32 am

Thanks so much, Charli, for sharing your reflections. I loved reading about your thoughts as you moved through my flash. And an honour to make you laugh. What a pity you had to miss the Chinese cemetery, but you could have some virtual sifting through bones with this novel. I didn’t mention in my review, but the first character ends up collecting the bones of workers who died building the railroad to send back to China. So even more in this novel that would appeal to you beyond the history of a marginalised community.

Reply
Charli Mills
8/12/2016 05:51:21 am

And that is what makes this Chinese cemetery unique -- it still exists and the bones have not been collected. It's a strange erasure that occurs. I will dig into this book, certainly.

Reply
Sarah link
8/12/2016 03:58:55 pm

Amazing review. And I still don't know how you manage to find the perfect book for each of the flash fiction prompts. Perfect. Though reading that list of "not allowed" for John made me cringe.

Ha! That was an unexpected twist for sure!

Reply
Annecdotist
9/12/2016 09:58:35 am

Thanks, Sarah. Sometimes I have a few reviews waiting to be posted so I have some flexibility about linking to the flash prompt. But in this case it was sheer serendipity. Sometimes the world lends a helping hand!

Reply
Norah Colvin link
9/12/2016 06:51:46 am

Love the flash. I did think it seemed a bit out of character for you though. Which it was! It's great the way you used it to reinforce your message to authors about writing fictional therapists. Sadly not all doctors and therapists are honorable. There is an article in the paper here today about a doctor, who was treating a patient for depression, taking her to a park and "having sex" with her immediately after the consultation. One wonders.
I particularly enjoyed this statement: "we all have a degree of choice over how much we internalise mainstream perceptions of who we are. " It's not always an easy choice though!

Reply
Annecdotist
9/12/2016 09:56:25 am

It is out of character for her writing, although I must warn you that my next novel has a lot of cock! Indeed, it’s true that, like anyone with the power to do so, doctors and therapists DO sometimes exploit people in their care. Professional standards, ongoing training and supervision can go some way towards minimising this risk, but it can’t be eliminated altogether. I suppose my gripe with some fiction is in the failure to represent what an extreme position this is and how it is at odds with a professional ethos.
I did wonder about that line about our choices, because we don’t all have the same degree of mental flexibility. So what look from the outside like someone choosing to accept others’ negative perceptions will often be them doing their best with their available mental resources. Thanks for flagging this up and giving me the opportunity to elaborate.

Reply
Norah Colvin link
11/12/2016 09:27:11 am

Now I have to say I'm a bit intrigued by this statement: "It is out of character for her writing," Her writing, but not her . . . :)

Reply
Annecdotist
11/12/2016 02:31:23 pm

Now, what intrigued you more, my writing about myself in the third person (a nonsense that slipped through via my voice-activated software, I'm afraid) but that the topic might be more important for me in real life than in my writing? No pressure to answer!

Reply



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