Free Food for Millionaires

Name: Free Food for Millionaires
Brand: Hachette Audio
Availability: InStock
Author: Min Jin Lee
ISBN: 9781549184628

Author: Min Jin Lee

Narrator: Jennifer Sun Bell

Unabridged: 25 hr 13 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Published: 05/05/2020

Categories: Fiction, Immigration, Literary Fiction

Synopsis

In the stunning debut novel from the New York Times bestselling author of Pachinko, the Korean-American daughter of first-generation immigrants strives to join Manhattan's inner circle.

National Book Award finalist Min Jin Lee introduces the unforgettable Casey Han: a strong-willed, Queens-bred daughter of Korean immigrants, who seeks both glamour and insight in Manhattan—a glittering borough she cannot afford. Fresh out of Princeton with an economics degree, no job, and a white boyfriend she cannot introduce to her parents, Casey is determined to claim a space for herself—but how and at what cost?

Lee’s bestselling, sharp-eyed, sweeping epic of ambition, dreams, and uncertainties of life—set in a landscape where millionaires scramble for free lunches the poor are too proud to accept—is an addictively readable, startlingly sympathetic portrait of intergenerational strife and immigrant struggle, revealing the fascinating lives of a vital community clinging to its old ways in a moneyed city of haves and have-nots.

“Mesmerizing.” —USA Today

Includes a Reading Group Guide.

About Min Jin Lee

You know that you have reached a pinnacle in your career, if you become a Double Jeopardy clue on the popular television show Jeopardy. Min Jin Lee was given that unique honor in July of 2018 under the category of, "Literary Types". Lee is definitely one of the best of the premier fiction writers in the world. She has received more awards and more notoriety than many other authors combined. Her novel, Pachinko, written in 2017, was the main work that garnered Lee such literary praise from all levels of critics, among them being an Adweek Creative 100, which placed her among the 10 Writers and Editors Who are Changing the National Conversation.

Lee was born in Seoul, South Korea, but her family came to the United States in 1976. She grew up in Elmhurst, Queens, New York from the age of 7. She spent much of her time in the library, where she learned to read and write. After earning her degrees, Lee worked as a corporate lawyer in New York for several years before she began her writing career in earnest. She has lectured at prestigious universities and colleges around the world. She now lives in New York with her son, Sam and her husband Christopher Duffy.

Reviews

Goodreads review by emma on March 23, 2025

at the end of the year when i've finished my reading challenge...that's long book season. and after pachinko, an extremely long family drama is now my idea of a good time. i love the core theme of this book so much: the idea that those who are poor or suffering value their pride, while the wealthy exp......more

Goodreads review by Thomas on March 04, 2018

3.5 stars While not as iconic as her sophomore novel Pachinko, Min Jin Lee's literary debut Free Food for Millionaires still stands as an important and entertaining read with a wide cast of characters. As a couple other reviews on Goodreads noted, you might have to be Asian - and more specificall......more

Goodreads review by Jennifer on July 20, 2007

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Unlike the majority of the reviewers, I liked Casey Han. I found her pursuit of higher education, materialism, desire for religion, lust, need for independence, mass credit card debt, love of fashion, and the way she constantly seemed to disappoint her family quite rea......more

Goodreads review by Bishop on February 29, 2008

I had been waiting for a long time to read the book. It was a page turner, peopled by overachieving kalbi eaters (my kind of people), full of sex, and ultimately... not all that. Actually it was kind of weak. Maybe it's me, but major plotlines involving getting internships while in business school (......more

Goodreads review by Katy O. on February 28, 2018

I LOVED this book! After reading and loving PACHINKO last spring, I knew I would need to come back to read this one and I am so so so happy that I did. Casey is such a flawed character, but she's flawed in so many of the same ways that I am.....and this made me love her so so so much. She may just b......more

Quotes

"Mesmerizing...Not since Jhumpa Lahiri's The Namesake has an author so exquisitely evoked what it's like to be an immigrant."—--USA Today

"This big, beguiling book has all the distinguishing marks of a Great American novel."—--The Times (London)

"Lee has updated the Victorian novel of progress to a postmodern, postfeminist world and imagined a character whose circumstances feel universal."—--Chicago Tribune