Book Description
for Dumpling Days by Grace Lin
From Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC)
Pacy and her family are spending a month over the summer in Taiwan. Pacy is excited to see her grandparents and other relatives, and eager to eat as many different kinds of dumplings as she can. But she’s also wary: her mother has signed Pacy and her sisters up for art classes with other Taiwanese American children. Pacy has been called a “Twinkie” in the past by Chinese American kids who think she’s too “white.” During weeks spent in bustling Taipei with their mother’s relatives, and in a country village with their father’s, Pacy and her sisters are immersed in family, food, and culture. The unfamiliarity of everything from language to public bathrooms makes Pacy appreciate how hard it must have been for her parents when they came to the United States. But in the art class, Pacy is frustrated. The kids don’t tease her, but the girl sitting next to her is determined to be the best in the class—a position Pacy is used to holding when it comes to art. Grace Lin’s latest novel about Pacy, first introduced in The Year of the Dog (Little, Brown, 2006), followed by The Year of the Rat (Little, Brown, 2008), is another sparkling, lively offering, but not without depth as Pacy learns to fully embraces being Taiwanese and American. (Ages 7–10)
CCBC Choices 2013. © Cooperative Children's Book Center, Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison, 2013. Used with permission.