Customer Reviews

China Boy

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Most of the reviews here are critical and misinformed. They appear to be written by disgruntled hisgh school students who have probably been assigned to read Lee's book as an effort to heighten their multi-cultural sensitivities. The kids miss the point. This is an excellent, sensitive novel about growing up in many worlds at once. Where ever Kai Ting is, is the wrong place, even home. His way of finding himself, finding a place, is through an unlikely venue, the local Y. There is a gritty truth thst comes off of every page here. Lee is exposing a great deal of his soul and, at the end, I felt part of his life. This was the first work of Lee's I read. My satisfaction with China Boy led me to the rest. He has much talent, a powerful voice and a sharp sense of humor... even when it hurts.

Kai, is the main protagonist of an inspiring novel called China Boy, which is written by Gus Lee. The novel is actually a "semi-autobiography", the author states, " `China Boy' is a story about my family in China before immigrating to the United States during the war and then (after we settled in the U.S.) my own attempts become a successful African-American male youth in the Panhandle of San Francisco." Even though Gus Lee has Chinese blood (in his childhood) he tries to adapt or assimilate into the American culture by learning the street fighting of blacks in the Panhandle. The book depicts the author's own struggle to defend himself during his childhood in the Panhandle. Fabricated with characters of different races, the story captures the vision of America as a "melting pot." Through the keen entangling-details of Ting's family fleeing to America, the boxing lessons that Kai takes at YMCA, and Kai's fighting with his stepmother and the bullies on the street one extricates the lesson that life always has trials and tribulations, some things can't be changed, but others can.

This novel is funny because the author uses slangs throughout the story to make the reader feel how people really talk and trying to use chinese words that is translated to how the word sounds. He uses descriptive words and a lot of metaphors in his writing which flows from one sentence to another and would not stop till the end of the book. The story is from a young chinese boy's perspective who is unaware what American culture is about, living in San Francisco in the early fifties and dealing with a new American stepmom who tries to erase the family's chinese culture. This book inspires me how this young boy reminds me of how fun a child can be, growing up, adopting new styles from the streets and where everything is always changing. I would recommend to anyone because it's easy to read, funny, and have a unique ending that you to find out for yourself.

This story of Kai Ting, the first American born boy of a family that fled China during the 2nd World War. When his mother dies, and father remarries, Kai's new American stepmother forces him out of the house and he must learn to survive among the tough culture of San Francisco's Panhandle during the 1950's. When he's repeatedly beaten until bloody, his father sends him to the YWCA to learn boxing to defend himself. There, he finds guidance, food, and lessons in becoming a man. You'll cry with this child and laugh at the humor in the book as Kai must try to overcome a horrible bully.

I only recently found out how autobiographical this book is, although I suspected it all along. It's too real--too painful--to be anything but. I can't say that I'd read it many times, because it's too painful a read (I found myself crying through half the book), but ultimately it's a hopeful book. It's easily one of my all-time favorite books. Check out the sequel, Honor and Duty.

(Another one of my favorites is the Farseer Trilogy [Assassin's Apprentice] by Robin Hobb and Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card.)

Gus Lee convincingly portrays the experience of a young boy from a Chinese family struggling to cope as a minority of one in his ethnic African American neighborhood. Confused also by being the only American-born member of his family and speaking Shangai not Cantonese Chinese, so that even Chinatown is an alien place, and dealing with a cold, Anglo-American step mother, the child tries to find his way through the cultural morass.

Throughout, Gus retains compassion for the players, even those shown in not such good light, and reveals a talent for observation and ability to portray emotion. Yet this is not a heavy-handed tug at the heart strings. It is leavened with humor and leaves one with a sense of hope.

Gus Lee's 'China Boy' was on my school's book club list this year. It was the first book I read from the list, and I must say that it was a delight to read.
This book tells the tale of an American-born Chinese boy.
Kai Ting is frail, skinny, and pale as can be.
And he is tired of being beat up by bullies.
So guess what? He joins the local YMCA for some boxing lessons!

This book has emotion, action, and some laughs here and there. It is a book about a boy who is struggling between two cultures. And it is just outright fun to read.

Gus Lee's writing is unique, eloquent, and beautiful--one of the best.

After reading about Kai Tings adventures, the reader can't help but simply love the books ending, which is funny and emotional. A very entertaining book.

As an Asian American, many of Kai Ting's experiences really hit close to home. The dialogue in this novel is clever and funny. Once I picked it up, I had trouble putting this book down. A refreshing novel.

In this novel largely based on his boyhood in San Francisco's Tenderloin, Gus Lee lays it bare for all to see, grow, take courage and heal from. What a tremendous Coming Of Age story the likes of which I'd never before read until China Boy. Lee's insight, even beyond his own life, is crystalline, and he offers up endless opportunities for readers to see beyond his immediate circumstances [as first born son of Chinese descent growing up in America] to the intricate web of people/places/things around him that forever shape his life.

There were places in this book that I laughed aloud, cringed, and even cried...but Lee's book is truly about the marvel that is life and the spirit that is indivisible from it. And he does it with a directness tempered by compassion and plain truth.

What a journey I've traveled in the last 6 days...it was a page-turning fete...With rites of passage being so removed from our television-numbed culture, I highly recommend this book. It is for EVERYONE who truly wants to get in touch with themselves, and be guided by the life-trials-celebrations of a young boy named Kai who stands as wise counsel for all of us.

Bravo Augustus Lee!
Enjoy!

Bead

The semi-autobiographical novel, China Boy, set in the predominantly Black Panhandle area of San Francisco, California, is the story of seven-year-old Kai Ting, the only son of a high born Mandarin family. After the tragic death of Kai's mother when he is six, Kai is ill-treated by his white stepmother, who is determined to erase everything Chinese from the Ting home, and by the neighborhood bullies, who are physically violent toward Kai. After Kai is supported by Toussaint and Mama La Rue who teach Kai about friendship, by Uncle Shim who teaches Kai about noble Chinese traditions and by a group of retired boxers at the YMCA who teach Kai to defend himself, he is able to confront the neighborhood bullies and stand up to his stepmother. Lee's novel renders the vibrancy of the Asian-American immigrant experience through a thoroughly appealing protagonist and rich supporting characters.