Beautiful country : a memoir Cover Image

Book

Beautiful country : a memoir

Wang, Qian Julie 1987- (author.).

Record details

ISBN: 0385547218
ISBN: 9780385547215
ISBN: 9780385547215
ISBN: 0385547218
Physical Description: x, 305 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm
print
Edition: First edition.
Publisher: New York : Doubleday, [2021]

Content descriptions

Formatted Contents Note:

How it began -- Home -- Ascent -- Dances and shadows -- Type B -- The beautiful country -- Silk -- Native speaker -- Dumplings -- Sushi -- Lights -- Chatham Square -- Hair -- Shopping day -- McDonald's -- Sleepover -- Trapdoors -- Solid ground -- Auntie love -- Normalcy -- Marilyn -- Graffiti -- Julie -- Hospital -- Mothers -- Surgery -- Gifted -- Graduation -- Tamagotchi -- Community -- Gone -- Home -- How it begins.

Summary, etc.:

In Chinese the word for the United States, Mei Guo, translates directly to "beautiful country." When seven-year-old Qian is plucked from her warm and happy childhood surrounded by extended family in China, she finds a world of crushing fear and poverty instead. For five years she lived undocumented after immigrating with her parents to New York City. Shocked at where her family fits in comparison to their status as educated elites in China, she works shifts alongside her mother in Chinatown sweatshops. Unable to speak English, isolated and disregarded, Qian put into special education classes and humiliated by teachers and classmates when she struggles to pay attention because of hunger or exhaustion. Her memoir illuminates the cruelty and indignity of America's immigration system, and the cost of making a home in a hostile land. -- adapted from publisher info