![]() ![]() ![]() In the final rushed pages, too much happens. I finished the book wanting far more about that emotional journey. But just when you feel like putting the book aside and making a donation to the American Civil Liberties Union in order to assuage the guilt, there’s a sharp observation or poignant remembrance that pulls you back. There’s so much that’s predictably horrible about Wang’s experience that it can sometimes make for repetitive reading. More often it makes you bitter and cruel. ![]() Wang picks up an important and under-explored thread, one that has been mined in books such as Katherine Boo’s meticulous exploration of Mumbai slum life, Behind the Beautiful Forevers: that being desperate doesn’t necessarily give you empathy. With a child’s honesty, she shows us how struggle can grind people down, making them as paranoid and cruel to each other as the system is to them. There’s no sentimental ennoblement of poverty in this book. a coming of age story that puts a fresh spin on the familiar tale of migratory hardship. ![]()
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