Eating Chinese Food Naked by Mei Ng, Hamish Hamilton, $170 Ruby Lee is no innocent Oriental nymph. Nymphomaniac would be a more accurate description. She likes sex often, and she does not mind who with.
Mei Ng's first novel unveils a raw Chinese sub-culture in the impoverished New York district of Queens, where Ruby's parents run the local laundrette.
The book is driven by the ordinary characters in this family. Nothing very dramatic happens, except that Ruby makes the slow transition to establishing an independent life as a second-generation Chinese American.
After graduating from a course in women's studies she moves back to the laundrette while deciding what to do with her life.
As a young adult, she assesses her childhood and her relationships with her parents and siblings. She finds some humanity within the conflicts born of poverty, days spent handling others' dirty clothes, her parents' loveless marriage and the huge cultural gap between the generations. The parents from China have been able to give little direction to their American children.
The book explodes some Chinese stereotypes. Ruby's eldest brother Van has a family of his own, but spends his time spaced out jamming on his guitar rather than being a responsible family man. His parents were raised in China, but migration had shattered the traditional concept of filial piety. Ruby's sister, Lily, is also unattractively selfish and dysfunctional.