Gish Jen Books in Order

Ralph Chang, his sister Theresa and his wife Helen come to America expecting to return to China. Political upheaval forces them to remain, and their pursuit of prosperity gradually changes their ideas about family, identity and American life.

In 1968, Chinese American teenager Mona Chang moves with her family to suburban New York and decides to convert to Judaism. Friendship, romance and work in her father’s restaurant complicate her exploration of belonging and cultural identity.

Eight stories explore immigration, assimilation, and the tensions of American identity across families and communities. Characters navigate generational conflict, cultural expectations, class differences, and uncertain belonging, revealing the contradictions beneath familiar ideas of success and opportunity.

A Chinese relative arrives to help care for the children of Carnegie Wong and his American wife, Blondie. Her presence unsettles their blended family, raising questions about loyalty, marriage and the intentions behind Carnegie’s late mother’s arrangements.

After losing her husband and best friend, Hattie Kong moves to a small town to begin again. A Cambodian immigrant family and a former lover join her there, drawing her into questions of faith, community and belonging.

Gish Jen explores how independent and interdependent ideas of the self influence art and storytelling. Combining family history, cultural observation, and research, she considers her development as a writer and differing traditions of memory, narrative, and individuality.

Gish Jen examines how cultural models of independent and interdependent selfhood influence perception, behavior, and storytelling. Personal accounts and research illuminate differences between East and West, offering a framework for understanding cross-cultural assumptions and the relationship between China and America.

In a divided future America governed by artificial intelligence, a girl from the disadvantaged Surplus population becomes a gifted baseball pitcher. Her chance to compete alongside the privileged Netted tests her family’s resistance to an oppressive social order.

Eleven linked stories trace ordinary lives through fifty years of changing relations between China and the United States. Family reunions, migration, money, and political transformation reveal how large historical shifts reshape intimate choices and connections.