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asianamlitfansWritten by Stephen Hong Sohn
Edited by Lina Jiang
I’m not going to lie. I had a couple of false starts with C. Pam Zhang’s How Much of These Hills is Gold (Riverhead Books, 2020). The prose is absolutely stunning and carries this novel forward up until the bittersweet end. Let’s let the marketing description give us some context: “An electric debut novel set against the twilight of the American gold rush, two siblings are on the run in an unforgiving landscape—trying not just to survive but to find a home. Ba dies in the night; Ma is already gone. Newly orphaned children of immigrants, Lucy and Sam are suddenly alone in a land that refutes their existence. Fleeing the threats of their western mining town, they set off to bury their father in the only way that will set them free from their past. Along the way, they encounter giant buffalo bones, tiger paw prints, and the specters of a ravaged landscape as well as family secrets, sibling rivalry, and glimpses of a different kind of future. Both epic and intimate, blending Chinese symbolism and reimagined history with fiercely original language and storytelling, How Much of These Hills Is Gold is a haunting adventure story, an unforgettable sibling story, and the announcement of a stunning new voice in literature. On a broad level, it explores race in an expanding country and the question of where immigrants are allowed to belong. But page by page, it's about the memories that bind and divide families, and the yearning for home.”
Zhang’s style is really all her own, and the relationship between the two siblings, Sam and Lucy, possesses a rawness that is as appropriate to their personal connection as it is to the landscape that they must survive. The novel basically opens with Sam and Lucy trying to find a place to bury their Ba. Through key anachronic sequences, we get a larger sense of what brought Sam and Lucy to this point. Most prominently, we discover that their father, Ba, has an incessant drive to prospect, to gamble, and to hope for a more stable future. Of course, given their status as Chinese Americans, they face considerable discrimination and barely eke out a sustainability living. The tenuousness of this future eventually takes an incredible toll, fracturing the family and eventually leading to Ba’s death. Despite his passing, the two try to make their way through the West. Eventually, the two part ways, with Lucy making a new life as Lucinda. She makes friends with the rich daughter of a prospector, only to discover that Sam has returned to town, upending the anonymity that Lucy had cultivated. Ultimately, the story is about Lucy and Sam’s enduring connection, and their desire to support each other, even as the odds always seem stacked against them. The conclusion takes Lucy and Sam to the City, a kind of fictionalized San Francisco, where they hope to gain passage to another land, somewhere that might be more welcoming of all of their social differences. Where Zhang leaves us is certainly not the Hollywood ending we might have desired, but it strikes as all the more appropriate given the harshness of the land, and the times in which they live. An exceptional debut.
Buy the Book Here
Edited by Lina Jiang
I’m not going to lie. I had a couple of false starts with C. Pam Zhang’s How Much of These Hills is Gold (Riverhead Books, 2020). The prose is absolutely stunning and carries this novel forward up until the bittersweet end. Let’s let the marketing description give us some context: “An electric debut novel set against the twilight of the American gold rush, two siblings are on the run in an unforgiving landscape—trying not just to survive but to find a home. Ba dies in the night; Ma is already gone. Newly orphaned children of immigrants, Lucy and Sam are suddenly alone in a land that refutes their existence. Fleeing the threats of their western mining town, they set off to bury their father in the only way that will set them free from their past. Along the way, they encounter giant buffalo bones, tiger paw prints, and the specters of a ravaged landscape as well as family secrets, sibling rivalry, and glimpses of a different kind of future. Both epic and intimate, blending Chinese symbolism and reimagined history with fiercely original language and storytelling, How Much of These Hills Is Gold is a haunting adventure story, an unforgettable sibling story, and the announcement of a stunning new voice in literature. On a broad level, it explores race in an expanding country and the question of where immigrants are allowed to belong. But page by page, it's about the memories that bind and divide families, and the yearning for home.”
Zhang’s style is really all her own, and the relationship between the two siblings, Sam and Lucy, possesses a rawness that is as appropriate to their personal connection as it is to the landscape that they must survive. The novel basically opens with Sam and Lucy trying to find a place to bury their Ba. Through key anachronic sequences, we get a larger sense of what brought Sam and Lucy to this point. Most prominently, we discover that their father, Ba, has an incessant drive to prospect, to gamble, and to hope for a more stable future. Of course, given their status as Chinese Americans, they face considerable discrimination and barely eke out a sustainability living. The tenuousness of this future eventually takes an incredible toll, fracturing the family and eventually leading to Ba’s death. Despite his passing, the two try to make their way through the West. Eventually, the two part ways, with Lucy making a new life as Lucinda. She makes friends with the rich daughter of a prospector, only to discover that Sam has returned to town, upending the anonymity that Lucy had cultivated. Ultimately, the story is about Lucy and Sam’s enduring connection, and their desire to support each other, even as the odds always seem stacked against them. The conclusion takes Lucy and Sam to the City, a kind of fictionalized San Francisco, where they hope to gain passage to another land, somewhere that might be more welcoming of all of their social differences. Where Zhang leaves us is certainly not the Hollywood ending we might have desired, but it strikes as all the more appropriate given the harshness of the land, and the times in which they live. An exceptional debut.
Buy the Book Here
