Donald Duk

by Frank Chin

Overview

"The 11-year-old hero of Mr. Chin's inventive, energetic first novel is educated in his Chinese heritage through a series of astonishing dreams about working on the Central Pacific Railroad in 1869."— New York Times Book Review "Doubt not the ability of the gifted, passionate, funny Mr. Chin."— New Yorker

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780918273833
Publisher:	Coffee House Press
Publication date:	01/01/1991
Pages:	176
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	6 - 18 Years

Editorial Reviews

The eponymous narrator of this first novel, which bulldozes stereotypes about supposed Chinese timidity and passivity, isn't a cartoon character but a smart 12-year-old Chinese-American boy who, with all the vehemence and certainty of youth, spits on everyone and everything Chinese. Although his female characters are underdeveloped and often the humor is broad and seems to exclude its audience, Chin's descriptions are acute and gifted, vivifying the virtuoso technique of Donald's father, who fashions 108 model airplanes--named for Chinese outlaw heroes--that he plans to launch and set afire during the Chinese New Year celebration, and Donald's nighttime dreams, which cast him as an underaged railroad builder in 1869 California, one of 1200 unheralded Chinese workers. The New Year festival in San Francisco's Chinatown becomes Donald's rite of passage and doorway to self-acceptance and -respect; Donald and the reader find themselves on an odyssey that is at once stinging and seductive, reclaiming the exquisite myths of a beautiful and proud ancient civilization. Chin wrote the short-fiction collection The Chinaman Pacific this is correct/pk & Frisco R.R. Co. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

In San Francisco's Chinatown, a boy's 12th Chinese New Year is a momentous occasion, but Donald feels cranky about the holiday, annoyed by his comical name, and by all things Chinese. Over the festive days, folklore, Donald's singular family, and his alluring dreams of the historic completion of the Central Pacific Railroad by Chinese workers in 1869 draw him to a new, emphatic racial pride. A California-based playwright, poet, and outspoken critic against Chinese-American stereotypes, Chin spices his first novel with a flip, clipped, present-tense narrative voice, slapstick dialog, and kinetic dreamscapes. The result is a tart social comment packed into a cartoon, with verbal energy verging on hyperactivity. Recommended for contemporary, regional, and YA fiction collections.-- Janet Ingraham, Spartanburg Cty. P.L., S.C.

Library Journal