World and Town

“Jen unwinds another expansive story of identity and acceptance, deploying voices that are as haunting and revealing as they are original…Jen’s prose is unique, dense, and enthralling, and her characters are marvels of authenticity.”

“Sharply funny and wisely compassionate, Jen’s richly stippled novel slyly questions every assumption about existence and meaning even as it celebrates generosity, friendship, and love.”

“One of Jen’s greatest strengths is her fluid point of view, which she employs beautifully here, alternating perspectives among Hattie, Sophy, and a local man named Everett, whose wife is Sophy’s sponsor at the Heritage Bible Church. Nothing is fixed for these unsettled characters, who keep trying to build new lives in a bewildering world, and whose victories, when they come, bring not rapture but ‘a defining grace, bittersweet and hard-won.’”

“Jen beautifully captures the pain of feeling invisible in a place where your every move is being watched, a place ‘where you can talk and talk and still have nobody hear.’”

“Jen’s sensitivity and charming humor should vault this to the top of book groups’ must-reads.”

“In this thick, satisfying sprawl of a read…Jen gracefully introduces some of the great issues of our time.”

“New lives, new towns, new worlds revolve around the character of Hattie Kong, a retired high school biology teacher who has moved to a New England town. Janet Song performs Gish Jen’s absorbing novel with tones that evoke the heroine’s Asian heritage and inner knowledge. Song moves through three vocal sensibilities with precision and clarity—an American accent, an Asian accent, and deftly suggested Asian dialects. Winner of the AudioFile Earphones Award.”

“Lovely…Jen is masterful at mixing keen observation with wit and wisdom, and she is in top form here.”