Dandelion, Jamie Chai Yun Liew
Dandelion, Jamie Chai Yun Liew
List: $22.99 | Sale: $16.09
Club: $11.49

Dandelion

Author: Jamie Chai Yun Liew

Narrator: Jennifer Hui

Unabridged: 9 hr 27 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: ECW Press

Published: 08/15/2022


Synopsis

When Lily was eleven years old, her mother, Swee Hua, walked away from the family, never to be seen or heard from again. Now a new mother herself, Lily becomes obsessed with finding out what happened to Swee Hua. She recalls the spring of 1987, growing up in a small British Columbia mining town where there were only a handful of Asian families; Lily’s previously stateless father wanted to blend seamlessly into Canadian life, while her mother, alienated and isolated, longed to return to Brunei. Years later, still affected by Swee Hua’s disappearance, Lily’s family is stubbornly silent to her questioning. But eventually, an old family friend provides a clue that sends Lily to Southeast Asia to find out the truth.Winner of the Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award from the Asian Canadian Writers’ Workshop, Dandelion is a beautifully written and affecting novel about motherhood, family secrets, migration, isolation, and mental illness. With clarity and care, it delves into the many ways we define home, identity, and above all, belonging.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Wendy on February 07, 2025

Read for Canada Reads 2025 Dandelion is an emotional portrayal of a woman's coming of age as a Chinese immigrant in a small town in British Columbia. Not being able to cope with the changes in their new life Lily's mother up and leaves. Many years later and about to become a mother herself Lily strugg......more

Goodreads review by Marsha on May 22, 2022

Heartbreaking, mesmerizing and real. Written with honesty, compassion and pain. Brava.......more

Goodreads review by Kate on August 17, 2022

4.5 I was intrigued by the book's synopsis and love to discover a new author (to me at least). Dandelion is a memoir-style fiction written by Lily who is a Canadian citizen. Her heritage however is somewhat more complicated and it us this heritage that frequently causes confusion and pain. Lily's fat......more

Goodreads review by Yalan on February 05, 2025

A compelling story massively let down by clunky, amateurish prose. The dialogue was particularly offensive: the author clearly used it at times for exposition, and generally, it didn’t feel like how people would actually talk. I was really annoyed by how the author would have a character speak Hokki......more

Goodreads review by Shannon on May 21, 2023

A moving debut novel about the complexities of interracial relationships, the challenges of new motherhood and the haunting legacy of a complicated mother-daughter relationship as new mother Lily tries to learn what made her Chinese mother abandon her as a child. Perfect for fans of The light of ete......more