'Hunger was a constant, reliable friend in Mei Guo. She came second only to loneliness.'
In China she was the daughter of professors. In Brooklyn her family is illegal.
Qian is just seven when she moves to America, the 'Beautiful Country',
where she and her parents find that the roads of New York City are not
paved with gold, but crushing fear and scarcity. Unable to speak English
at first, Qian and her parents must work wherever they can to survive,
all while she battles hunger and loneliness at school. Thus begins an
extraordinary story that describes, in vivid colours, days labouring in
sweatshops and sushi factories, nights scavenging the streets for
furniture, and the terrifying moment when the family emerges from the
shadows to seek emergency medical treatment for Qian's mother.
Qian Julie Wang's memoir is an unforgettable account of what it means to
live under the perpetual threat of deportation and the small joys and
sheer determination that kept her family afloat in a new land. Told from
a child's perspective, in a voice that is intimate, poignant and
startlingly lyrical, Beautiful Country is the story of a girl who learns first to live - and then escape - an invisible life.
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