American Han
By Lisa Lee
Algonquin Books
There’s this story that Korean children are told about two siblings: Chun and his brother (who isn’t even worth naming). Chun is virtuous and smart; he ends up bringing his family good fortune. His brother is spoiled and selfish.
In “American Han,” by Lisa Lee, Jane Kim and her brother Kevin both identify as Chuns.
“Every family has a Chun, and there can be more than one. But for every family of Chuns, there’s always a Chun’s brother. I wonder if we don’t sometimes create Chun’s brother out of the fear that if we don’t attach that name to someone else, it will attach to us.”
Jane is the perfect child on paper. She excels in school, is a naturally gifted athlete, and has set herself up for a lucrative career as a lawyer. In contrast, her brother Kevin is a failed tennis pro with bad grades who’s estranged from his family.
But that’s just on paper. In reality, Jane has secretly dropped out of law school and wants to move to New York for a fresh start. And Kevin, well. She hasn’t heard from him in a while so she doesn’t really know, but he’s always been the one with actual passion and who worked hard.
In “American Han,” Jane’s family’s story unfolds in four parts. Each focuses on a member of her nuclear family, ending with herself. Each section feels like a series of interconnected short stories that paint a complicated portrait of a family living in Napa, California, in the early 2000s.
Jane’s parents are dreamers. Her mom has her sights set on becoming a real estate tycoon in the Bay Area. After a divorce that was a long time coming, her dad is finally living his dream of being a trucker, driving all across America. But before that, they were immigrants who settled in a part of California that barely had any Korean people. They pushed their kids to excel and assimilate, banning them from speaking Korean at home.
There’s a pressure cooker of model minority stew that I feel like people sometimes avoid talking about in mixed company because it feels stereotypical. “My parents were not Tiger Parents,” I already hear you saying. I’ve said it too. I usually have mixed feelings when it’s portrayed in books, maybe because it feels voyeuristic in a way. But Lee weaves a tale that is both interesting and complicated. Yes, there are external expectations from parents. Yes, there’s weird pressure from others to succeed. But Lee captures a fundamental truth about the psyche of high-achieving Asian Americans: sometimes the call is coming from inside the house. It’s not just about becoming successful or “making it.” There’s an ever-present fear of becoming Chun’s brother, and it can make you do extreme things.
Throughout the book, there’s frequent foreshadowing to Kevin losing it and doing something bad. He puts his heart and soul into becoming a tennis pro. But no matter how hard he works, he’s never as good as Jane (who doesn’t even want it). Eventually he quits and becomes a cop, only to find out that people do not generally look favorably on the profession. What he does is surprising, but I believe it. There’s only so much one can take before they explode.
Lee doesn’t sensationalize tragedy, and the plot isn’t oriented toward the big reveal. Instead she explores the quiet (and sometimes just overt) misogyny of East Asian culture and the complicated family dynamics it causes when it follows people to America. Jane is a golden child with a lot of chaotic flaws and equal amounts of heart.
“American Han” is the kind of book that keeps you looking past the surface, even through Jane’s eyes, each family member is doing the best with what they’ve inherited, even when striving is not enough.
