Midnight at the Dragon Café

Set in the 1960s, Judy Fong Bates�s much-talked-about debut novel is the story of a young girl, the daughter of a small Ontario town�s solitary Chinese family, whose life is changed over the course of one summer when she learns the burden of secrets. Through Su-Jen�s eyes, the hard life behind the scenes at the Dragon Caf� unfolds. As Su-Jen�s father works continually for a better future, her mother, a beautiful but embittered woman, settles uneasily into their new life. Su-Jen feels the weight of her mother�s unhappiness as Su-Jen�s life takes her outside the restaurant and far from the customs of the traditional past. When Su-Jen�s half-brother arrives, smouldering under the responsibilities he must bear as the dutiful Chinese son, he forms an alliance with Su-Jen�s mother, one that will have devastating consequences. Written in spare, intimate prose, Midnight at the Dragon Caf� is a vivid portrait of a childhood divided by two cultures and touched by unfulfilled longings and unspoken secrets.