Interior Chinatown

 Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu, 273 pages.

This book was brilliant, but also not really for me. The novel follows Willis Wu, who thinks of himself as "Generic Asian Man" and works as a bit actor on the cop procedural "Black and White." He dreams of someday being "Kung Fu Guy," like his father before him, the greatest aspiration he can imagine for someone like him. Ultimately, Willis begins to wonder if he should dream bigger, and if there could be more than one way to exist available to him. Ultimately, this is a book not only about the history of race in America (especially centered on the experiences of Asian immigrants and Asian Americans), but also on the history of perceptions of race in America, which I thought was a particularly interesting direction.

I believe I may be a bit to literal for this book. I spent most of it way to caught up on what was real, what was actually happening, versus what was happening in the show, or in the story, and ultimately it definitely impacted my enjoyment. The screenplay format this novel uses is very interesting and effective, but it also definitely contributed to my overall confusion. This is not a literal book, but I don't seem to be capable of releasing that framework. 

However, there are still definitely scenes from this novel that will stick with me for a long while. The trial scene in particular is one that I've thought of a lot since I read it. Overall this is a well-crafted novel with a lot to say, even if narrative isn't one of it's strong suits.