{"id":49773,"date":"2022-09-01T11:28:10","date_gmt":"2022-09-01T15:28:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/?p=49773"},"modified":"2022-10-14T19:35:58","modified_gmt":"2022-10-14T23:35:58","slug":"which-side-are-you-on-by-ryan-lee-wong-in-booklist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/which-side-are-you-on-by-ryan-lee-wong-in-booklist\/","title":{"rendered":"Which Side Are You On by Ryan Lee Wong [in Booklist]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

In the short opening paragraph introducing a young man watching his mother approach the LAX curb in her new Prius, debut novelist Ryan Lee Wong manages to pack in generation gaps, climate change, brutal colonialism, and \u201clet[ting] go of that ancestral sh*t sooner or later.\u201d<\/p>\n

Columbia student Reed has returned home because his grandmother is dying. He\u2019s recently become a \u201cserious activist,\u201d protesting yet another Black man\u2019s wrongful killing, this time by a Chinese American NYPD officer. His urgent declarations aren\u2019t impressing his Berkeley-trained, political-careered Chinese American dad (unions) and Korean American mom (nonprofits), who \u201ctalked about [his] activism with the same condescension other parents talked about their kids\u2019 singer-songwriter career.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over the next few days, in between maternal sessions in self-care, Reed\u2019s foulmouthed mother reveals her history as cofounder of L.A.\u2019s Black-Korean Coalition, her childhood immigration, and her dying mother\u2019s lifelong suffering. Arriving with polarizing platitudes, Reed returns to school with invaluable lessons on the dangers of simplistic idealism, conventional history, better allyship, and unconditional love.<\/p>\n

With empathy plus sighing, cringing, and laughing, Wong provides quite the education for us all.<\/p>\n

YA\/General Interest<\/b>:\u00a0The revelations of Wong\u2019s protagonist will resonate with mature teens, especially those with parents whose lives they\u2019ve never questioned.<\/p>\n

Review<\/strong>: “Fiction,” Booklist<\/em>, September 1, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n

Readers<\/strong>: Young Adult, Adult<\/p>\n

Published<\/strong>: 2022<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the short opening paragraph introducing a young man watching his mother approach the LAX curb in her new Prius, debut novelist Ryan Lee Wong manages to pack in generation gaps, climate change, brutal colonialism, and \u201clet[ting] go of that ancestral sh*t sooner or later.\u201d…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49878,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6,38,6535,31],"tags":[6608,6668,58,10,11,135,24,51,39,29,10465,10464],"class_list":["post-49773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-adult-readers","category-fiction","category-korean-american","category-repost","category-young-adult-readers","tag-bookdragon","tag-booklist","tag-coming-of-age","tag-family","tag-friendship","tag-grandparents","tag-historical","tag-identity","tag-parent-child-relationship","tag-race-racism","tag-ryan-lee-wong","tag-which-side-are-you-on"],"yoast_head":"\nWhich Side Are You On by Ryan Lee Wong [in Booklist] - 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