Inheritance

by Lan Samantha Chang

Overview

Spanning seven decades and set in China and America against a backdrop of political chaos and social upheaval, this arresting debut novel tells a timeless story of familial devotion undermined by deceit and passion and rebuilt by memory.

In 1931, abandoned after their mother's suicide, the young Junan and her sister, Yinan, make a pact never to leave each other. The two girls are inseparable—until Junan enters into an arranged marriage and finds herself falling in love with her soldier husband. When the Japanese invade China, Junan and her husband are separated. Unable to follow him to the wartime capital, Junan makes the fateful decision to send her sister after him. Inheritance traces the echo of betrayal through generations and explores the elusive nature of trust.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393344769
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	04/30/2012
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	866,501
File size:	864 KB

About the Author

Lan Samantha Chang is the author of three novels: The Family Chao, Inheritance, and All Is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost. Her work has been translated into nine languages. The director of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, she lives in Iowa City.

Editorial Reviews

In her first book, Hunger: A Novella and Stories, Chang focused on the intricate, sometimes hallucinatory tensions in Chinese-American families straddling the old country and the new. But in Inheritance she shifts her perspective, seeing American life almost as a postscript. The novel's action, viewed in retrospect from New York in the 1990's, takes place almost entirely in the China of midcentury, amid its tidal waves of political and social change. Shaped by their country's traditions, Yinan and Junan struggle with the shattering alterations to the world their mother knew: love, enmity and mutual need serve both to bind the two sisters and to force them apart.
— The New York Times

Richard Eder

A complicated sister bond echoes through generations in this somber follow-up to Chang's well-received debut novella and stories, Hunger. In China in the early 1930s, sisters Junan and Yinan are inseparable, even as Junan matures into beauty and Yinan remains awkward and plain. Junan enters into an arranged marriage and falls in love with Li Ang, her soldier husband. Separated from him when the Japanese invade China, Junan sends the unmarried Yinan to keep her husband's household. What is intended as an arrangement of convenience turns to betrayal when Li Ang and Yinan have an affair. As China is divided by communism, the family is also rent in two. Junan and her daughters Hong (who is also the narrator) and Hwa end up in the States, while Yinan and Li Ang remain in mainland China with their son and are effectively banished from memory. It is memory-rather than dramatic action-at which Chang excels; her prose is lovely, but even images of the turmoil of war and displacement read at somewhat of a remove. Still, the sense of long family histories both spoken and unspoken is powerful, and the restrained conclusion has the force of Ishiguro's The Remains of the Day. Chang's sophomore effort may not chart new ground, but is still a solid effort. Agent, Jin Auh. 4-city author tour. (Aug.) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Chang follows up her award-winning short story collection, Hunger, with her first full-length novel, a multigenerational tale ranging from 1925 in China to the early 1990s in the United States. Seven years in the making, it was well worth the wait. Hong narrates the ongoing story of her mother, Junan, and her Aunt Yinan. During the Japanese invasion of China, the sisters' oath to stay together against all odds is broken. Junan, the stronger of the two, marries Li Ang, a soldier who is called to duty. When she can't follow him, she sends Yinan; the two eventually fall in love and have a child-the only male to be born in the family up to then. Chang adeptly portrays the strengths and weaknesses of her well-defined characters; her narrative flows well, except for an abrupt transition from Taiwan to the United States, which makes for a rushed ending. Readers who enjoy the works of strong women writers like Amy Tan, Gail Tsukiyama, and Hong Ying will relish this novel. Highly recommended for most fiction collections, especially those that specialize in Asian American fare. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 4/1/04.]-Shirley N. Quan, Orange Cty. P.L., Santa Ana, CA Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

"The book's strength is its characters, who are driven by love, crafty relatives, and a hunger to know the past."

Boston Globe

"A polished story, smooth as stone. It is most poignant as it delves into the follies that make us human."

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

"A guilty pleasure that makes for an indulgent afternoon, its an intelligent and well-formulated work of literature."

San Francisco Chronicle - Anhoni Patel

A guilty pleasure that makes for an indulgent afternoon, its an intelligent and well-formulated work of literature.--Anhoni Patel "San Francisco Chronicle"

A polished story, smooth as stone. It is most poignant as it delves into the follies that make us human.-- "Milwaukee Journal Sentinel"

The book's strength is its characters, who are driven by love, crafty relatives, and a hunger to know the past.-- "Boston Globe"

From the Publisher