Crying in H Mart

I've never read a book like Crying in H Mart, that saw me so clearly and wrapped me up so fully.

My mom came to the US from China in her 20s and met my dad, a white East Coaster who now has a new Chinese wife after they divorced. I grew up mixed, in suburban Massachusetts where my race was a source of confusion and the butt of jokes for my 98% white classmates. I rejected my culture, and in many ways my own mother, in many of the same ways Michelle did. Her accounts of living life as a mixed person sliced straight through me and felt like looking in a mirror. I don't speak Chinese at the fluency I wish I did because I rejected it so fully as a teenager. I can't cook most traditional Chinese dishes, and when my grandmother passed I mourned the loss of my ability to ever learn from her how to fold dumplings like she did, “the little rat” dumplings with ridges down the middle that sit up on their own.

Of course the book is devastating, but somehow in many ways it was also deeply and tremendously comforting. Comforting that I could know my mother and my ancestors despite the barriers and pain that came before. Comforting to feel proud of Michelle as she learned Korean dishes from YouTube, which I always privately thought would be cheating if I did it myself. Comforting to see the love of her family, in all it's forms, and the joy and release of ritual and memory.

I loved this book. I've lived my life feeling half and half, and this book made me feel whole.