Fortunes

A New York Times Editors' ChoiceA Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2016Davies writes with a rare emotional resonance and a deft sense of structure; it's hard not to be in awe of the way he's composed this complex, beautiful novel . . . Stunning. NPRDavies [is] a master storyteller. Entertainment WeeklySly, funny, intelligent, and artfully structured, The Fortunes recasts American history through the lives of Chinese Americans and reimagines the multigenerational novel through the fractures of immigrant family experience.Inhabiting four livesa railroad barons valet who unwittingly ignites an explosion in Chinese labor, Hollywoods first Chinese movie star, a hate-crime victim whose death mobilizes Asian Americans, and a biracial writer visiting China for an adoptionthis novel captures and capsizes over a century of our history, showing that even as family bonds are denied and broken, a community can surviveas much through love as blood.