Mott Street: A Chinese American Family’s Story of Exclusion and Homecoming

Fifth-generation Chinese American Chin (Eating Wildly) offers a sensitively drawn, self-narrated exploration of her family’s remarkable history. Chin, raised by her single mother and grandparents, discovers that relatives on both sides of her family converged upon a single apartment building in Manhattan’s Chinatown. Hoping to learn more, she embarks upon a deep dive into her eclectic family history, populated by politicians, railroad workers, midwives, business owners, and more. Describing these individuals, she gives free rein to her emotions, expressing tenderness for her intersex aunt, Elva Lisk; admiration for Wu Doshim, who produced a newspaper with only 7,000 pieces of Chinese movable type when 30,000 were needed; and rage when imagining her great-grandmother Cheung To Chun desperately trying to reunite with her husband amid draconian governmental restrictions. Chin is eloquent as she describes the senselessly cruel Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and points out that anti-Asian violence and discrimination continue today.