![]() ![]() With his unsettling, deadpan humor and heartbreaking honesty, Willis weaves in and out of multiple roles throughout the novel - he is Generic Asian Man Number Three, Special Guest Star, Kung Fu Guy, and even Kung Fu Dad. And the only quasi-protagonist that an Asian man can ever be is Kung Fu Guy. He is tired of being Dead Asian Man or Generic Asian Man. ![]() Imprisoned in perpetual poverty and tired racial tropes by systemic causes and by himself (hence the Chinatown-gates-turned-prison on the cover), protagonist Willis Wu is desperate to finally be just that - a protagonist. Charles Yu’s “Interior Chinatown” is not only beautifully moving but also mounts a shockingly explicit political criticism of U.S. Just like its exterior, this book is beautiful and jarring at once. There is something oddly magnetic about seeing a familiar Chinatown gate, estranged by its uncanny merging with another familiar symbol - the prison. A purposefully distressed red cover is simultaneously reminiscent of a red packet, a newspaper cover, and a playbill.At the center is a small Chinatown gate the interior area of the gate frames are filled by what resembles a prison or a birdcage. “Interior Chinatown” is that kind of book. You shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but sometimes, you can take one look at a book and know it’s going to be good. ![]()
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