Aliens in America [Paperback]

Sandra Tsing Loh (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 1997

From the best-selling author of Depth Takes a Holiday comes a comic monologue for sons and daughters everywhere, who feel that their parents must have been beamed to Earth from another planet. Original."

Product Details

• Paperback: 94 pages
• Publisher: Riverhead Trade; 1st edition (September 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1573226270
• ISBN-13: 978-1573226271
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.1 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,526,010 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This lady can write; she will be one of tomorrow's stars, July 5, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Aliens in America (Paperback)

Sandra Tsing Loh is a wonderful writer. This book and her set of essays "Depth Takes a Holiday" showcase a new talent. She combines humor with a tight, very easy, flowing language. "Aliens In America" consists of 3 essays, each about her family and her father -- the retired aerospace engineer who decides to import another wife from China. This is a very insightful, fun book. It's short and will leave you asking for more. Follow this lady, she's good. She'll probably be the Dorothy Parker of 2000 and beyond.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Chinese and German accents, wonderfully funny!, February 2, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Aliens in America (Audio Cassette)

I loved the audio version of this book. The print version probably doesn't do it justice, as so much of the impact is in the accents and inflections of Loh's performance. This is not a mean-spirited book. One can hear Loh's affection for her parents even as she pokes fun an their idiosyncrasies. As an audio reviewer I listen to many books, but Loh's earns top marks. It's a funny and touching tribute to our multicultural society.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Immigrants in the West Coast melting pot, June 16, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Aliens in America (Paperback)

I'd rather would have heard or seen the performances these stories are based on, simply because the spoken word with all its inflictions and shadings would have added to the mood of the pieces and made the subjectivity of them more obvious. Still, I enjoyed the book a lot, and I think it describes well the struggles a second generation immigrant has to go through while trying to adapt to the mainstream culture of the country her parents have moved to. And in contrast to the previous reviewer I think that Loh is not so sure whether it is better to burn all the bridges, and turn American, as she is trying to do as a young girl and as an adolescent, or to stick to the culture of her ancestors, as her father is doing. Aside from that, the stories are also quite funny in their descriptions of the battle of wits between her free-wheeling German mother, who is always looking for fun and luxury, and her Chinese father, who in the meantime braces himself for impeding disaster.