I read this book at different times - the wonder of reading short stories I've found is being able to read them as you wish, over time or all at once. The collection is described as covering the Chinese diaspora across the globe over the past hundred years, and yet there are only seven stories, a few heartbreaking. Cultural and racial prejudice, the demands of society and family, and the intrusion of real life impact the relationship between people in each of these stories. This explains the title of the short story collection, We Two Alone.

*special thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC copy in exchange for an honest review!

4 stars
2021 has really been killing it with the short story collections. I can’t get enough.
This centers on Chinese diaspora across the globe.
I liked how these stories spanned the world and time. We visit Asia, Europe, Africa, North America and moves from the 1920’s to present day.
It touched on many different aspects of living as an immigrant and politics that surrounded the people of China for the last 100 years.
All the stories packed an emotional punch and the characters and the stories were very diverse. There’s sadness, loss, hope. It’s a beautiful collection.

This is a beautifully-written and collated collection of short stories, each chronicling a different, and often unexpected, aspect of Chinese immigrant life. The characters are expertly crafted and the story lines, while short, and are deep and engaging--I wanted to read more, to know what happened next. But the stories are perfect as they are, and made me aware of politics and events I should have known more about in the experiences of Chinese in North America. This is an excellent book for book clubs and schools, especially if read in conjunction with other factual and literary accounts of late 19th and 20th century Chinese and American history.

Short stories focusing on the experiences of Chinese Immigrants in a wide range of countries and situations.