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The Joy Luck Club
1989
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Encompassing two generations and a rich blend of Chinese and American history, the story of four struggling, strong women also reveals their daughter's memories and feelings. - (Baker & Taylor)

The Joy Luck Club is one of my favorite books. From the moment I first started reading it, I knew it was going to be incredible. For me, it was one of those once-in-a-lifetime reading experiences that you cherish forever. It inspired me as a writer and still remains hugely inspirational.” —Kevin Kwan, author of Crazy Rich Asians

Amy Tan’s beloved, New York Times bestselling tale of mothers and daughters, now the focus of a new documentary Amy Tan: Unintended Memoir on Netflix


Four mothers, four daughters, four families whose histories shift with the four winds depending on who's "saying" the stories. In 1949 four Chinese women, recent immigrants to San Francisco, begin meeting to eat dim sum, play mahjong, and talk. United in shared unspeakable loss and hope, they call themselves the Joy Luck Club. Rather than sink into tragedy, they choose to gather to raise their spirits and money. "To despair was to wish back for something already lost. Or to prolong what was already unbearable." Forty years later the stories and history continue.

With wit and sensitivity, Amy Tan examines the sometimes painful, often tender, and always deep connection between mothers and daughters. As each woman reveals her secrets, trying to unravel the truth about her life, the strings become more tangled, more entwined. Mothers boast or despair over daughters, and daughters roll their eyes even as they feel the inextricable tightening of their matriarchal ties. Tan is an astute storyteller, enticing readers to immerse themselves into these lives of complexity and mystery. - (Penguin Putnam)

The Joy Luck Club is one of my favorite books. From the moment I first started reading it, I knew it was going to be incredible. For me, it was one of those once-in-a-lifetime reading experiences that you cherish forever. It inspired me as a writer and still remains hugely inspirational.” —Kevin Kwan, author of Crazy Rich Asians

Amy Tan’s beloved, New York Times bestselling tale of mothers and daughters


Four mothers, four daughters, four families whose histories shift with the four winds depending on who's "saying" the stories. In 1949 four Chinese women, recent immigrants to San Francisco, begin meeting to eat dim sum, play mahjong, and talk. United in shared unspeakable loss and hope, they call themselves the Joy Luck Club. Rather than sink into tragedy, they choose to gather to raise their spirits and money. "To despair was to wish back for something already lost. Or to prolong what was already unbearable." Forty years later the stories and history continue.

With wit and sensitivity, Amy Tan examines the sometimes painful, often tender, and always deep connection between mothers and daughters. As each woman reveals her secrets, trying to unravel the truth about her life, the strings become more tangled, more entwined. Mothers boast or despair over daughters, and daughters roll their eyes even as they feel the inextricable tightening of their matriarchal ties. Tan is an astute storyteller, enticing readers to immerse themselves into these lives of complexity and mystery. - (Random House, Inc.)

Author Biography

Amy Tan is the author of The Joy Luck Club, The Kitchen God’s Wife, The Hundred Secret Senses, The Bonesetter’s Daughter, The Opposite of Fate: Memories of a Writing Life, Saving Fish from Drowning, The Valley of Amazement, Where the Past Begins: Memory and Imagination, and two children’s books, The Moon Lady and The Chinese Siamese Cat, which was adapted into a PBS television series. Tan was also a coproducer and coscreenwriter of the film version of The Joy Luck Club and was librettist for the opera version of The Bonesetter’s Daughter. Her essays and stories have appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies, and her work has been translated into thirty-five languages. She lives with her husband in San Francisco and New York. - (Penguin Putnam)

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Table of Contents

FEATHERS FROM A THOUSAND LI AWAY
JING-MEI WOO: The Joy Luck Club
19(23)
AN-MEI HSU: Scar
42(7)
LINDO JONG: The Red Candle
49(18)
YING-YING ST. CLAIR: The Moon Lady
67(22)
THE TWENTY-SIX MALIGNANT GATES
WAVERLY JONG: Rules of the Game
89(13)
LENA ST. CLAIR: The Voice from the Wall
102(14)
ROSE HSU JORDAN: Half and Half
116(16)
JING-MEI WOO: Two Kinds
132(17)
AMERICAN TRANSLATION
LENA ST. CLAIR: Rice Husband
149(17)
WAVERLY JONG: Four Directions
166(19)
ROSE HSU JORDAN: Without Wood
185(12)
JING-MEI WOO: Best Quality
197(18)
QUEEN MOTHER OF THE WESTERN SKIES
AN-MEI HSU: Magpies
215(27)
YING-YING ST. CLAIR: Waiting Between the Trees
242(11)
LINDO JONG: Double Face
253(14)
JING-MEI WOO: A Pair of Tickets
267

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