![]() ![]() Charles Yu divides the book in half, setting up the dramatic tension, shooting himself, and then dealing with it. ![]() While he starts the book shooting himself, it’s not until halfway through that the reader actually gets to that moment in the story. In the end, I recommend the audio book, but if you happen to have a physical copy on hand, it may benefit you to leaf through every couple of chapters. I’d probably still be calling them “section squiggle”. On the other hand, some of the book was divided up by Greek letters and hearing them pronounced was much easier than if I had come across them on my own. Certain chapters have diagrams and there is a moment with footnotes that fell flat both when the footnote was inserted and later when it was read. There were a few times when reading the physical book would have been better. James Yaegashi was an excellent Charles Yu, playing up the handyman living through science fiction who was raised on stories of Star Wars. I read this book in an audio format, by Recorded Books, Inc. It is an understatement to compare him to Douglas Adams, but The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Universe is as close a book I can think that hits these ideas this clever. How his AI and retconned dog exist as the two characters we see more than anyone else real or alive. The way he describes landing the time machine not in space, but in actual time. Very early on he describes the woman he never married and it is such a fun way of introducing that concept, I was bought in for whatever else he wanted to do. Something Charles Yu excels at is writing around an impossible idea so that it can be seen in an impossible way. This playful loopy way of understanding the situation is how much of the book reads, only smarter. The two Charleses may be the same person, but that’s essentially true about all our identical selves from alternate universes. And it’s not Charles Yu the author of the book that shoots himself, but Charles Yu the time machine repairman, whose father became lost in time when he invented his own time machine and disappeared. This is not the case for the book Charles Yu gives himself as he is shot by himself, though that may be true, you never really get to read it in full. I kill my own future.” are the first lines of the book How To Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe. What else am I supposed to do? I kill him. He steps out of a time machine, introduces himself as Charles Yu. His second collection, Exhalation, was chosen by The New York Times as one of the 10 Best Books of 2019.“When it happens, this is what happens: I shoot myself. His first collection Stories of Your Life and Others has been translated into twenty-one languages, and the title story was the basis for the Oscar-nominated film Arrival starring Amy Adams. Ted Chiang's fiction has won four Hugo, four Nebula, and six Locus Awards, and has been reprinted in Best American Short Stories. His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and Wired, among other publications. He lives in Southern California. Yu’s previous novel, How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe, was a New York Times Notable Book and a TIME Top 10 Fiction Book of 2010.Ĭharles Yu is a recipient of the National Book Foundation’s 5 Under 35 Award, and he was nominated for two Writers Guild of America Awards for his screenwriting work on the HBO series, Westworld. In addition to writing for Westworld, Yu has been on writing staffs for shows on FX and AMC. A National Book Award winner and a “Most Anticipated Book” by Entertainment Weekly, TIME, The Rumpus, and others, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, who has been cast in the role of “Generic Asian Man” in the ongoing procedural cop show “Black and White,” as he struggles to transcend the rigid and reductive roles available to those who look like him.īoth extensively researched and startlingly original, Interior Chinatown is a profound and topical exploration of the weight of stereotypes, racism, and assimilation in American culture. Interior Chinatown, his fourth and most recent novel, is at once a satirical meditation on immigration, assimilation, and Hollywood stereotyping of Asian Americans and a touching portrait of a family. Hailed for his sharp wit and incisive social commentary, Charles Yu is an acclaimed author and screenwriter whose work is as inventive as it is moving. Ted Chiang, author of Exhalation, will moderate. Join a conversation with Charles Yu, author of the National Book Award winner Interior Chinatown. This is a virtual event, taking place via King County Library System’s Crowdcast Channel! Register for this event here!
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