About this Event
ABOUT BOLD FORK BOOK CLUB
Our food writing section has it all - fiction, memoir, food studies, history and more. Led by a member of our team, Bold Fork Book Club is a monthly in-shop event where we pick a book to read ahead and discuss together in a group-- with snacks! Books will be available for pick up starting February 19th.
If you want to learn more about food and meet other members of the Bold Fork community, this is the group for you. Past Book Club books have included: Franchise by Marica Chatelain, Land of Milk and Honey by Pamela Zhang, and Consider the Fork by Bee Wilson among others.
NOTES:
THE AUTHOR WILL NOT BE IN ATTENDANCE.
IF YOU BUY A TICKET WITH A BOOK YOU WILL BE EMAILED WHEN YOUR BOOK IS READY FOR PICK UP OR SHIPMENT.
ABOUT THE BOOK
A bittersweet story of love between two women, nested in an artful exploration of language, history, and power. May 1938. The young novelist Aoyama Chizuko has sailed from her home in Nagasaki, Japan, and arrived in Taiwan. She’s been invited there by the Japanese government ruling the island, though she has no interest in their official banquets or imperialist agenda. Instead, Chizuko longs to experience real island life and to taste as much of its authentic cuisine as her famously monstrous appetite can bear.
Soon a Taiwanese woman—who is younger even than she is, and who shares the characters of her name—is hired as her interpreter and makes her dreams come true. The charming, erudite, meticulous Chizuru arranges Chizuko’s travels all over the Land of the South and also proves to be an exceptional cook. Over scenic train rides and braised pork rice, lively banter and winter melon tea, Chizuko grows infatuated with her companion and intent on drawing her closer. But something causes Chizuru to keep her distance. It’s only after a heartbreaking separation that Chizuko begins to grasp what the “something” is.
Disguised as a translation of a rediscovered text by a Japanese writer, this novel was a sensation on its first publication in Mandarin Chinese in 2020 and won Taiwan’s highest literary honor, the Golden Tripod Award. Taiwan Travelogue unburies lost colonial histories and deftly reveals how power dynamics inflect our most intimate relationships.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Yáng Shuang-zi is a writer of fiction, essays, manga and video game scripts, and literary criticism. Her works have been translated into Japanese and French.
Lin King’s writing and translations have appeared in Boston Review, Joyland, Asymptote, and Columbia Journal.
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Bold Fork Books, 3064 Mount Pleasant Street Northwest, Washington, United States
USD 6.61 to USD 21.08
