This modern retelling of The Brothers Karamazov is silly, sad and thought-provoking. Chang looks into what Chinese-American assimilation can look like and does challenge many stereotypes. I would say this is more literary fiction than a mystery/thriller which maybe is why I felt like it was really slow for the first half of the book. Truly I was just waiting for when Leo was going to die - I mean, good riddance. That man was awful. None of the characters are likable but I found myself sympathizing for Winnie because she seemed like she had the least amount of freedom and choices. My reservations aside, I think this is will be a popular book!

phew! i finally finished this book one day before pub day, so i'm happy! this book was a whirlwind and in the beginning, i didn't really know what was going on and i didn't like it, partly because the characters were so vulgar and absurd and complex it was really hard to love them. however, after the first third of the book, i became really invested in the story. i read the last half in one sitting, and i think finding out all the things about leo chao's murder was really fulfilling. so, overall, i would give this book a 3.5/5!
as a chinese american woman, i picked up this book to support my fellow asian american author (also, the first asian american woman in charge of the iowa writers' conference, which is SO cool!). i wasn't quite prepared for the sarcastic, absurdist, and literary way this book was written, but once i got used to it, i loved it. in a story based off the brothers karamazov like this one (and i had to look up the dostoyevsky tale because i couldn't remember everything that happened halfway through the book), centering around the murder of an extremely verbally and emotionally abusive, exploitative, generally piece of shit father, i understand why the author used the sarcasm and writing style she did. there's honestly no other way, especially when each of the brothers struggles so much with internalized racism and wishing they could leave their toxic family.
my favorite character was most definitely fang. i know he's probably the most minor character, but he was the ONLY one who understood the way i viewed the entire trial plot -- one of white supremacy and racist stereotypes. dagou was hard to love, and i mostly pitied him, for his inability to become free from his father (go to therapy, please), his inferiority complex due to his emasculation as an asian male, and as a consequence, his whole going-after-white-women-to-prove-his-masculinity stuff (even though at the end he really did love brenda). ming i also pitied, but i think had more respect for partly because he wasn't degrading about women and sex like dagou. his mental breakdown at the end was a real insight into what racial trauma looks like and i just really felt bad for him for how deeply he hated himself and his chineseness. james was obviously the loveliest of the boys, but i honestly saw him as a BOY in the sense that he was so naive and optimistic about the world. also, his pining for alice was just very... lol why do men kind of vibe. alice was herself an interesting girl and i like how she was able to break free of her mom and have some character development. we love to see a chinese american woman find her voice! winnie was i felt the stereotypical chinese mom who stuck with her abusive husband for as long as she possibly could and in the end, still loved him in her own way and asked her sons to forgive their father. that's admirable to me because it's not the route i would've gone with. it sometimes frustrates me that chinese women are expected to give this kind of forgiveness in the face of such terrible abuse, but i guess if it gave winnie peace, then i'm glad she did it. brenda was an interesting character, being the white woman and sex symbol of the book, and i'm glad she had more of an arc than just being dagou's whore or something. katherine was... weird. like i just found it so annoying that she couldn't break off her engagement with dagou when he was clearly into brenda. like, girl, don't you have any dignity? in the end i was like, i guess katherine and ming are going to be together, but also it's kind of awk that she dated your older brother for so long. and i feel like katherine and dagou just didn't have any boundaries in their relationship post break up, too, especially when brenda is mad she goes to see him for an hour once he's in prison. definitely weird vibes, but i understand why she clung on to him so much being an adopted chinese girl.
now for the two villains: o-lan and leo chao. o-lan, i realized about 75% of the way through, is the name of one of the main characters in a good earth by pearl buck. i'm sure the author made that choice deliberately, and i'm curious as to why? perhaps if i had read the good earth recently i'd understand, but i do not really remember much about that book. o-lan was a complicated character who was only really fleshed out at the very end, and it was surprising to me that she killed leo chao, but honestly? i'm not mad about it. leo deserved what he got and o-lan served. i'm glad she found her peace if that's what gave it to her, even if it did traumatize literally everyone else. i think the analyses she had of the three chao brothers was very observant and pretty much the way i felt and i think that her character was really interesting in not only providing critiques on what it means to be chinese american but also what it means to just simply be a chinese woman, and a chinese daughter. leo chao, on the other hand, exemplified everything i hate about straight cis men, from boasting about sexual conquests to just being so self centered to knowing they have power and exploiting it. leo was actually my most hated character, and with good reason, i think. he was just vulgar, crude, cruel, manipulative, abusive, exploitative, uncaring, arrogant, selfish, greedy, capitalist -- what a great job the author did characterizing him! i hated his GUTS and cheered when he was finally murdered. a slow, painful death is what he deserved and that is probably a really carceral thing for a leftist like me to say, but, like i said before, he totally deserved it.
oh, and the whole thing with alf -- talk about pertinent analyses on racist stereotypes! also love how the chinese names for all the brothers and the chinese-people-eat-dog myth were linked together. and fuck the skaers (and the jury), they exist everywhere and so many white people never realize they're THAT kind of problematic.
anyways, this is a very long and probably very rambly review (it IS 2:30 AM), but i'm glad i finished this book in time for pub day and i ultimately had a good time reading it. that being said, i think only certain people will like this writing style and the way the characters are described and characterized.) the book definitely offered a sharp critique of being chinese american and there were many times i was like, YES, when i was reading it, so i'm really grateful to be seen in another book by an asian american woman!

The Chao family of The Family Chao is no simpler and a lot more complex than many other families, just as Chang's wonderful book is much more layered and nuanced than many other family dramas. Woven throughout the story of each of three son's place in the family is a sharp focus on being the children of non-white immigrants and the self-loathing that it imbues. Insightful, beautifully written, and all-engrossing, The Family Chao reveals much about each reader, sometimes in unsettling ways. I look forward to reading more from this talented author.

Thank you to NetGalley, W.W. Norton, and Ms. Chang for the opportunity to read an ARC of this title. An honest review was requested but not required.

Full disclosure, I have not read The Brothers Karamazov although I suppose I ought to. Therefore many of the references and themes in the Family Chao probably were not appreciated as much as they should have been, and I can’t review the book with an eye to its reinterpretation of the original work.

The Family Chao is nonetheless a fascinating character study of three brothers and to a lesser extent their parents and other characters. There’s also a mystery but to be honest this seemed secondary to the character studies. Maybe tertiary, if you could the lovingly detailed (and drool-worthy) descriptions of Chinese cookery. Seriously: don’t read this book while hungry.

In all honesty I really didn’t care who killed Leo. As another character pointed out, there were many who wouldn’t mind if he were out of the picture, so to speak. I also didn’t believe for a moment that Alf had been eaten. (I was more worried that he’d frozen to death outside in the snow, which is a completely realistic fear in winter in the Midwest.) I was more interested in the unravelling of the three brothers’ characters and how thing would end up with them. Absolutely fascinating. I am not an immigrant and therefore have no real experience with the authenticity of feelings and circumstances these brothers undergo, but I was completely convinced by their stories.
…And, let’s be real, subsequently completely sidetracked by the food.

Very enjoyable book overall.

THE FAMILY CHAO by Lan Samantha Chang is the story of three brothers: Dagou, the eldest, is a chef in the family restaurant; Ming, the middle son, is a well-off financier; and James is a college student. Their father is killed and a murder trial ensues, but I gave up well before then – the first few pages are filled with profane language and a sexual fantasy which all seemed totally gratuitous for a book which had potential to join our high school collection. THE FAMILY CHAO was extremely disappointing, especially since many authors (Jean Kwok, Viet Thanh Nguyen, and Jess Walter, for example) whose works are on our shelves promoted this new title. Perhaps adult readers will find this work more palatable? Kirkus and Publishers Weekly both gave it starred reviews.

Lan Samantha Chang’s The Family Chao revolves around a Chinese American immigrant family settled in Haven, Wisconsin who own and operate a Chinese restaurant serving the local community. It follows the three songs, Dagou, Ming and James, as they return home for Christmas one year and are forced to confront the ongoing conflicts within their family (primarily against their father Leo Chao). The day after their community Christmas dinner, Leo is found dead in the meat freezer and we follow the brothers as Dagou, the oldest son, is accused of murdering their father.

Described as a murder mystery on some sites, the trial/death of Leo Chao doesn't actually start until about the halfway mark of the book, so it's a little slow going. And I'm not sure if adding that detail in the summary blurb serves its purpose because the first half of the book is more of a family drama/literary fiction feel -- really laying down the groundwork of the family dynamics, relationships, and each brothers' identity within the family and, to a larger extent, as an Asian man in a midwestern town so as I was reading, it felt a little bit like, "so when is this going to happen? when is the promised plot point going to start?" Not to say that the first half of the book was bad, it just conflicted with the short blurb that Netgalley and other sites have summarized for this story.

Once the trial started, the story definitely picked up pacing-wise, but I think I enjoyed the slower reflective parts of the first half because you really see how each brother sees themself, and each other, in the world. I found a lot of parallels within my own sibling dynamics and I felt like Chang really captured what it felt like to grow up in a household as a child of immigrants. Beautifully done, really nicely written and also really funny in some parts - as awful as Leo was he had some great one liners.

Who killed Leo Chao and why? That's the question at the root of this novel about an incredibly dysfunctional family with three sons-James. Ming, and Dagou- all of whom intensely dislike both him and themselves. Much has been made about this being a rework of The Brothers Karamazov but don't worry if you never read that Russian classic. I'm not sure what someone who knows that novel well would make of this or how it's unique to TBK because frankly the themes from the original have run through literature about unhappy families since even before it was written. That said, Leo, who owns a Chinese restaurant in Haven, Wisconsin, is especially dreadful, having grown even worse since his wife Winnie left him to become a nun at a spiritual center. James, the youngest son, is still in college, Ming has turned his back on his heritage, and Dagou feels trapped. He's broken with his girlfriend Katherine who was adopted from an orphanage in China and sees the Chao family as her cultural touchstone. Leo ha a secret, which isn't revealed for a long time. No one, except Winnie, is either happy or sympathetic and yet she's no longer part of the family and she's the least fleshed out. It's an interesting but it unfolds slowly from the dynamic beginning. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. For fans of literary fiction.

I haven't read the book this is based upon, so I did go into this with no ideas/expectations. While I genuinely like books where the characters aren't perfect - or even likeable - I felt that this family and these characters were not worth reading. The book felt jumpy to me and I never felt like I got to know a character extremely well. I didn't love this one, even though it's getting great reviews.

The Family Chao is an effervescent and intriguing novel about the Chao family, who own a Chinese restaurant in Wisconsin. It is a contemporary retelling of The Brothers Karamazov. I haven’t read The Brothers Karamazov, so I may be missing out, but the novel is enjoyable nonetheless. It’s a little confusing at the beginning because so many characters and situations are introduced in a short span of time, but the writing and vibrant sense of place and personalities immediately drew me in.

Thank you W.W. Norton & Company and NetGalley for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Modeled on the Brothers Karamazov from a contemporary Chinese American perspective, The Family Chao is the story of three brothers at very different places in their lives who come together for a Christmas dinner at their family’s restaurant, a gathering with consequences beyond what any of them could have imagined. Chang’s story is a delightful and fast-paced murder mystery full of relatable but incredibly flawed characters, exploring issues of family, race, and defeated dreams.

3.5
This is a unique and imaginative book that is unlike anything I've read before. The Chao family is complicated and imperfect. The family dynamics are not stereotypical of a Chinese American family. The three Chao sons are distinct individuals - all with his issues and shortcomings. There are uncomfortable confrontations and relationships which are explored. A murder mystery drives the plot of the story but at the heart of the novel are the personalities and the workings of an unusual family.

The Family Chao by Lan Samantha Chang Family drama with immigrant family dynamics that have an unexpected dark side. Slow paced read. Most members of the dysfunctional Chao family are unlikable, It was, however, interesting to read about a different culture and traditions.

Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to preview the book.

A family drama and murder mystery with moments of candid introspection for each of the three brothers who were featured. Compelling and different from other books I've read, pleasantly so.

AHHHHHHH I LOVED THIS SO MUCH!! I am an absolute sucker for a good retelling and since i had never read a retelling of the brothers karamazov i knew i had to read this!! This is a fantastic book and truly an amazing look inside a family. The dostoyevsky influence is clear but this book never feels redundant. I loved this! Highly recommend.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance reading copy in exchange for an honest review.

I love the premise of this book. It promises a meeting of genre and literary fiction with an Asian American heart. But what I got ultimately is a retelling of The Brothers Karamazov that feels unjustified and unfulfilled. What’s the purpose of writing an almost beat-for-beat remake of a 19th-century Russian novel? How does it contribute to Asian American art? Further our stories?

The beginning is wonderful. Lan Samantha Chang clearly considers writing a craft. Her sentences are sharp and varied. Starting the novel with the youngest son, James, coming home from his first college term in the city to his midwestern hometown feels like an appropriate bildungsroman-esque point at which to explore evolving notions of identity and family.

I also appreciate the fact that Chinese words in this story aren’t italicized. While a white writer might have italicized “jia li jiao” to denote an othering, here it blends in with the neighboring roman text—there’s no need to set off the typeface of words that have been present your entire life.

There are no likable characters, and I find that a jarring problem for a novel exploring an Asian family’s immigration to and assimilation in the US. The father in particular, Leo Chao, has not a single redeeming quality. In an early meeting, Leo rants at his youngest son seemingly out of nowhere:

“All you ABCs! You think since you’re not here first, since you have different eyes and dicks, you’re not good enough for fucking around. You got it backwards. We came to America to colonize the place for ourselves. That means spreading seed. Equal opportunity for fucking. You know what’s the biggest disappointment of my life? Seeing my oldest son pussy-whipped by one white woman.”

Leo is such a caricature that I was constantly taken out of the story and questioning: What Asian dad is actually like this? The crassness is alienating and unfamiliar. It almost reads like dialogue meant for white readers.

The characterization of Ming, the second son, is disappointing in other ways. Ming openly admits to self-hatred, which manifests in never eating Chinese food and refusing to date Asian women. Both facts are ludicrous and again have me asking: What Asian man manifests hate in this way? Is this a commentary on MRAsians? The story—fortunately—gradually makes clear that Ming is in love with an Asian woman, and there are beautiful moments between the two, but the end result isn’t enough to undo the ridiculous premise.

Not every narrative about Asian families needs to be heartwarming and affirmative, nor should they be. Immigrant families are messy and multifaceted. But the Chao family offers few insights. The death of the Chao patriarch has me—and apparently his family—feeling little more than “good riddance.”

—@eljc00

Blood and Culture in America

At first, I thought The Family Chao was a reboot of The Brothers Karamazov. I changed my perception when I thought about the consideration of Chinese immigrants into the American scene. Chang’s ability to make the reader feel the pain of the Chinese immigrant, or possibly any immigrant in the United States, is stunning. The looks of the Chinese are distinctive, and all the cruelty of many white Americans are played out in the lives of the three Chang sons. Not surprisingly, the family owns a Chinese restaurant. The setting is more unusual; it’s in Haven, Wisconsin where the physical difference of the Chinese against a white population is more impressive.

Dagou, the oldest son is the head chef; Ming, the middle son lives in New York and has worked hard to become wealthy and survive in our corporate world; the youngest is James, a college student who has lost his ability to speak Mandarin. Chang paints a definitive picture of the Chinese in our educational and social system. The three sons are diverse and emotional.

Heading up the family is Leo, a tyrannical father. Winnie is the loving mother who left Leo and lives a spiritual life. The work ethic of the family is especially powerful in this immigrant family.

All is not peaceful when Leo is found dead in the restaurant’s freezer and the police suspect murder. There is a trial, a mystery, secrets, and a big dose of dysfunction. I stayed with the book but at times, it became convoluted and long-winded. However, it’s important to stay with the plot to the end.

My gratitude to NetGalley and Norton for this pre-published book. All opinions expressed are my own.

Throughout The Family Chao by Lan Samantha Chang, you will find a lot of giving and taking. This is a very engaging Shakespearean drama about a family.

The Christmas holiday is approaching and the Chao family is preparing to celebrate with its annual dinner at their restaurant in a small Wisconsin town, Haven. But this year’s festivities will be a bit different. Leo, the owner and patriarch, has had a very rocky relationship with just about everyone, but especially his three sons and wife, Winnie. She has left him and entered a Buddhist monastery within their community. The oldest son, Dagou, has had the responsibility of cooking at the restaurant. He has received no thanks, recognition or real compensation for his endeavors from his father. Dagou gave up his dreams of musicianship to return to home and become a master chef. The second son, Ming, has pursued his dreams of wealth and status in the financial world. He has tried to distance himself from his toxic father, and even his own heritage. In spite of his accomplishments, he is also treated with disdain. James, the youngest, is enrolled in university perhaps aiming towards a premed degree. He is the most sensitive and least confrontational child. He is not seen as a fully formed “man.” The dinner reunion brings out fears, anger, desires and secrets. Each brother is hiding something from the others and themselves. Father and mother also have secrets, as do many in their circle of acquaintances. When all three brothers reunite at home for this dinner the table is set for how they will go into the future of their community and the family.

The second half of the book is concerned with the murder of one of the family members. Who is the perpetrator? Who had the opportunity? With so many suspects, anyone could be culpable. Loyalty and family bonds are tested.

This book explores family dynamics, the immigrant experience, restaurant culture, access to achievement, revenge and sex. There are descriptions of fabulous foods, a courtroom trial and a family French bulldog, Alf, that adds some levity. Loved the author’s irony in some of the names. This is a book that stays with you as you wonder how the author so successfully maneuvered between all the issues and characters and plots. Highly recommended. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing this title.

I have been to Chinese restaurants in Wisconsin and never thought that there was King Lear happening in the kitchen. The beats of the story are familiar, but Chang is able to deliver distinct characters. The brothers Chao have similar scars from their father, but they each react differently. I couldn't read the plural of the family name without thinking of chaos.

Leo and Winnie Chao, immigrants from China, came to the small, midwestern city of Haven, Wisconsin and opened a Chinese restaurant. Of their three sons, Dagou, the oldest, came back home to run the restaurant only to have his father renege on his promise to give him the restaurant. Ming became a success elsewhere and stays away as much as he can and the youngest, James, dutifully fulfilled his parents' wishes and is in medical school. When they all converge the old faultlines fracture and when the Chao patriarch is found dead, the suspicion falls on one son.

Lan Samantha Chang bases this on The Brothers Karamazov and it's hugely fun to see where she has chosen to follow that novel and where she diverges. But there's no need to have read, or even be familiar with the Dostoevsky; this novel is wild and fun and full of its own heart. Chang has taken the framework to create her own memorable group of siblings. I've been a fan of Chang's work since I read her previous novel, All is Forgotten, Nothing is Lost and this new book shows the same beautiful writing, while being utterly different.