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Qian Julie Wang

Beautiful Country : A Memoir of An Undocumented Childhood

€14,95
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.

Format: Paperback
Published: UK, 2022
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Pages: 288
ISBN 13:  9780241514702
ISBN 10: 0241514703


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Beautiful Country : A Memoir of An Undocumented Childhood

€14,95