2023 PEN/Hemingway Award (nominee)
How can we live with integrity and pleasure in this world of police brutality and racism? An Asian American activist is challenged by his mother to face this question in this powerful—and funny—debut novel of generational change, a mother’s secret, and an activist’s coming-of-age
Twenty-one-year-old Reed is fed up. Angry about the killing of a Black man by an Asian American NYPD officer, he wants to drop out of college and devote himself to the Black Lives Matter movement. But would that truly bring him closer to the moral life he seeks?
In a series of intimate, charged conversations, his mother—once the leader of a Korean-Black coalition—demands that he rethink his outrage, and along with it, what it means to be an organizer, a student, an ally, an American, and a son. As Reed zips around his hometown of Los Angeles with his mother, searching and questioning, he faces a revelation that will change everything.
Inspired by his family’s roots in activism, Ryan Lee Wong offers an extraordinary debut novel for readers of Anthony Veasna So, Rachel Kushner, and Michelle Zauner: a book that is as humorous as it is profound, a celebration of seeking a life that is both virtuous and fun, an ode to mothering and being mothered.
Genre: General Fiction
Twenty-one-year-old Reed is fed up. Angry about the killing of a Black man by an Asian American NYPD officer, he wants to drop out of college and devote himself to the Black Lives Matter movement. But would that truly bring him closer to the moral life he seeks?
In a series of intimate, charged conversations, his mother—once the leader of a Korean-Black coalition—demands that he rethink his outrage, and along with it, what it means to be an organizer, a student, an ally, an American, and a son. As Reed zips around his hometown of Los Angeles with his mother, searching and questioning, he faces a revelation that will change everything.
Inspired by his family’s roots in activism, Ryan Lee Wong offers an extraordinary debut novel for readers of Anthony Veasna So, Rachel Kushner, and Michelle Zauner: a book that is as humorous as it is profound, a celebration of seeking a life that is both virtuous and fun, an ode to mothering and being mothered.
Genre: General Fiction
Praise for this book
"With terrific, original use of language; a flawed, highly sympathetic protagonist; a fast pace; and a tone that is at once irreverent and sober, Which Side Are You On offers unusual insight into Asian-Black dynamics and the fight for racial justice in America. Ryan Lee Wong is an impactful new voice." - Bisi Adjapon
"Salty, funny, angry, and heartbreaking, Which Side Are You On synthesizes the struggles of a family that has been working and hoping for a better world for two, maybe three, generations, and in the process, renews our sense of the histories involved--American history, Korean American history, Black history, Los Angeles history. This is a stunning debut, but also a novel I didn't know I was waiting for." - Alexander Chee
"Which Side Are You On is a sharp and refreshing debut that tenderly plumbs the depths and angst of coming of age. In Reed, we find a narrator seeking meaning in radical politics, and finding more about his family and himself in the search than he knew was possible." - Naomi Jackson
"Sharp, fast-moving, and often hilarious, Which Side Are You On is a must-read: a story of Asian American relationships--familial, intergenerational, and otherwise--through the lens of Black-Asian histories, community organizing, and radical politics." - Lisa Ko
"Salty, funny, angry, and heartbreaking, Which Side Are You On synthesizes the struggles of a family that has been working and hoping for a better world for two, maybe three, generations, and in the process, renews our sense of the histories involved--American history, Korean American history, Black history, Los Angeles history. This is a stunning debut, but also a novel I didn't know I was waiting for." - Alexander Chee
"Which Side Are You On is a sharp and refreshing debut that tenderly plumbs the depths and angst of coming of age. In Reed, we find a narrator seeking meaning in radical politics, and finding more about his family and himself in the search than he knew was possible." - Naomi Jackson
"Sharp, fast-moving, and often hilarious, Which Side Are You On is a must-read: a story of Asian American relationships--familial, intergenerational, and otherwise--through the lens of Black-Asian histories, community organizing, and radical politics." - Lisa Ko
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