Amy Tan storyteller

Author Biography

As a child Amy Tan believed her life was duller than most. She read to escape. Her parents wanted her to be a doctor and a concert pianist. She secretly dreamed of becoming an artist. She began writing fiction when she was 33.
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Influences

The Holy Ghost of my father and the Chinese ghosts of my mother.

The American Dream and the Chinese family's interpretation of that.

Free books from the library every week and reading books that appeared on the banned book lists.

Writing secret letters to my friends about running away to Haight-Ashbury and writing thank you letters as my mother dictated them to me in bad English.

The early deaths of my older brother and father and my mother's belief that I would die next.

An SAT score in the 400s for English and SAT score in the 700s in Spanish

Listening to my mother and her friends gossip in Chinese. Understanding Chinese but not being able to speak it.

Luck and an amazing amount of it.

Web Links

AmyTan.net

Talking to Ghosts

Date of Review:

02/18/2001

Published Work:

Reviewer:

Nancy Willard

Source:

The New York Times

Review Excerpt:

Armenian folklore has it that three apples fell from heaven: one for the teller of a story, one for the listener and the third for the one who ''took it to heart.'' What a pity heaven awarded no apple to the one who wrote the story down. For Amy Tan's splendid new novel abounds not only with tellers and listeners but with people who truly understand stories and people who preserve them.

''The Bonesetter's Daughter'' is divided into three sections. The first, set in present-day California, introduces us to Ruth Young, a Chinese-American woman whose 10-year relationship with the man she loves is deteriorating for reasons she doesn't understand. When her mother shows signs of dementia, Ruth suddenly becomes aware of what her mother's memory loss means: the disappearance of stories that will help Ruth understand her family and give her the sense that she is part of a story larger than her own. The middle section of the novel is the memoir written a few years earlier by Ruth's mother, LuLing, so that her daughter will know the truth about LuLing's life in China. The third section focuses once more on Ruth, and what she will do with the knowledge she has gained.