Number One Chinese Restaurant: A Novel
Multi-cultural fiction, Family stories, General fiction
Synthetic audio, Automated braille
Summary
Named a Summer Must-Read by TIME Buzzfeed Star Tribune Fast Company The Village Voice The Wall Street Journal Toronto Star InStyle and O The Oprah Magazine A joy to read … I couldn t get enough Buzzfeed This novel practically thumps with heartache and sharp humor Chang-rae Lee New York Times bestselling author of Native Speaker An exuberant and wise multigenerational debut novel about the complicated lives and loves of people working in everyone s favorite Chinese restaurant The Beijing Duck House in Rockville Maryland is not only a beloved go-to setting for hunger pangs and celebrations it is its own world inhabited by waiters and kitchen staff who have been fighting loving and aging within its walls for decades When disaster strikes this working family s controlled chaos is set loose forcing each character to confront the conflicts that fast-paced restaurant life has kept at bay Owner Jimmy Han hopes to leave his late father s homespun establishment for a fancier one Jimmy s older brother Johnny and Johnny s daughter Annie ache to return to a time before a father s absence and a teenager s silence pushed them apart Nan and Ah-Jack longtime Duck House employees are tempted to turn their thirty-year friendship into something else even as Nan s son Pat struggles to stay out of trouble And when Pat and Annie caught in a mix of youthful lust and boredom find themselves in a dangerous game that implicates them in the Duck House tragedy their families must decide how much they are willing to sacrifice to help their children Generous in spirit unaffected in its intelligence multi-voiced poignant and darkly funny Number One Chinese Restaurant looks beyond red tablecloths and silkscreen murals to share an unforgettable story about youth and aging parents and children and all the ways that our families destroy us while also keeping us grounded and alive