The Wangs vs The World by Jade Chang
Spoilers throughout the post
Each chapter of the book is from the point of view of a
different character. In the Wang family there is Charles, Barbra, Saina,
Andrew, and Grace.
The chapters are each numbered with Chinese characters instead of numerals. Also there's some conversations in Chinese that are in pin yin so you might need to get someone to help you translate if you don't know Mandarin.
Charles Wang – Chinese name Wang Da Qian. Family fled to
Taiwan away from the Communists when he was young. He went to school at National
Taiwan Universitu. Before senior year, his parents sent him to America with “a
list of fertilizer manufacturers” to help earn the family fortune back.
Instead, he got into the cosmetics industry and grew big. He married his first
wife May Lee who was a model. They had a house in Bel-Air. May Lee died getting
onto a helicopter to view the Grand Canyon in order to rekindle their marriage
after the third child was born. After the death of his first wife, Charles
married Barbra who he knew back in Taiwan.
Barbra – Chinese name Hu Yue Ling. Full Taiwanese, her
family worked in the University where she met Charles. She always had a crush
on him. One summer she decided to work on her appearance and lose some weight
but when school started back up, Charles had already left for America. After
awhile, one of her classmates heard from Charles that he was going to be
marrying a model. When she had heard about May Lee’s death, she took all of her
parents’ savings and flew to America to find Charles.
Saina – The oldest child and daughter lives in Helios, New
York by herself. She lived in Manhattan for a while as an artist until she had
a failed show and her then fiancé,
Grayson, cheated on her and got another girl pregnant. Saina moved to Helios as
a personal exile from society and also away from everything that reminded her
of Grayson. But he came looking for her saying that the other girl lost the
baby and Saina was the only one for him. After being together for awhile, his
son was born. She found out that Grayson had lied to her and he went back to
his baby-mama. Besides Grayson, Saina was dating Leo – a local – who took her
back after Grayson left.
Andrew – The second child and oldest son. Goes to school at
Azusa Pacific University and wants to be a comedian. He believes in waiting to
find love before having sex. He has his car repossessed the day everything
happened. As Charles goes around picking up the children, they stop in New
Orleans and he meets the thirty-five year old Dorrie who not only gets to him
to have sex but also to stay in Louisiana with her instead of going to New York
with his family to get Saina. After a few days of being with Dorrie he realizes
that they don’t love each other (blinded by the sex) and he leaves her behind.
Andrew goes around the state trying to figure out what to do and finally
performs a comedy routine that goes well. He ends up having to fly to Beijing
when their father ends up in the hospital.
Grace – The youngest child and daughter. She is away at boarding
school in Santa Barbra. She’s only able to pack up the basics of her
possessions when she finds out. Grace is in the teenage rebellious stage and
she wants to be a fashion designer. Grace is the first one to be picked up by
the dad and is on the journey the longest.
Charles has about $10,000 stowed away in cash and that is
the money the family uses to travel across the country. At one point, they stop
at one of his factories (and break in) to pick up a shipment of some cosmetics
for a small town general store that Charles personally helped kick start.
Unfortunately, the products had melted by the time they reached the
destination. Another stop along the way was to New Orleans where one of
Charles’s longtime friend Nash lives. This is where Andrew leaves the journey.
And somewhere in North Carolina the family get into a car crash. They get a
rental car and Grace drives the entire way to New York while her dad and
stepmother sleep.
Keep scrolling to see how the book ends.
If you don't want to know then the post ends here for you.
You have been warned.
After getting to Saina's house, Charles leaves Barbra and Grace there to fly to Beijing by himself and find his land. When he gets to his land he finds out that his grandparent's friend had been pretending to be him (Charles Wang) for years and had already claimed the land. But the impostor is a gambler so he gambled the deed to the land away. Charles gets into a fight with the man and ends up in the hospital - as a result of the fight and the mini strokes he has been suffering from.
The three children and Barbra all fly to Beijing to see Charles in the hospital. The book ends with Charles dying while surrounded by his family and his last words are "Daddy discovered America!" This was his way of saying that he found his place in America and was able to prosper.
It was a happy-sad ending. I cried a lot afterwards and wished the book were longer so I could find out what happens when the kids get back to the States.
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