I picked this book because of the title. My maternal Grandma was Russian and Chinese and food was her only love language. So the idea of growing up in a Chinese family that owned a restaurant is something I could relate to. Knowing everything I know now I wonder if this family was as into Munchausen by Proxy as much as mine. I know the people in my family who love cooking are the ones who like to poison others the most. I may be the only person in the world who likes cooking just for the food and not for poisoning of people.
I have read a lot of books throughout my life and they normally boil down to a few lines that really resonate and bring value/meaning.
“Being different made me normal.”
Every coming of age story, whether it is written or not, is about finding out what makes you you. And finding what makes you you is really about finding what makes you different than the people around you. When you find what makes you different, you find what makes you you. We all search for this in different ways but rarely does it seem this simple. This line is like an equation on how to come of age. I just wish someone had shared this with me thirty years ago.
“…not everything damaged needed to be fixed.”
So much of our lives we try to fix our damage. But what if that damage is what makes us who we are? What if our damage is what shapes us into the person we need to be in order to complete our purpose here? Maybe it is the imperfections that make us who we are. Maybe it is not damage at all, but divine order?
I read this book in less than 24 hours. It was great and a quick read for about 300 pages. Again, I had no clue who the author was before I chose the book. But I would recommend it to anyone. Growing up in a part Chinese family that does not value education, it was hard for me to imagine the pains of having to be pushed to educate myself. But every life has it’s struggles. Our families do shape us, no matter how much we try to rebel and say they don’t. We just have to take the good and throw out the bad. This book was the author trying to figure out what was the good and what was the bad. We all have this struggle. And some never overcome it.