The Great Wall of Lucy Wu by Wendy Wan-Long Shang

There is a magical box at my office. It’s called “the box at the end of the hall.” The box at the end of the hall is where all the books people want to get rid of end up. And it’s where I found this gem.

I get you Lucy Wu. I, too, have a long lost aunt that no one knew existed until we started filling out her immigration papers. I, too, struggled with understanding what exactly it meant to be Haitian-Canadian… -American-Quebecois-Floridian. Yep. I don’t play basketball like you but that fight your parents had with your brother Kenny about college? Yeah. I had that fight with my parents too.

All the characters, even the minor ones, are well-developed and multi-faceted. They push Lucy to evaluate her choices and be a better person. This middle-grade book was a super quick read and I recommend it to anyone (of any age) who is struggling with their heritage and identity.

Wendy Wan-Long Shang is Chinese, making this the first book that fits into my Heritage Reads challenge! Can you suggest any other East Asian writers whose work I should check out?