Free Food for Millionaires

When the listener learns that Korean-American Casey Han carries a copy of George Eliot's MIDDLEMARCH around in her bag, it become clear that this is more than "chick lit" about a career girl in the big city. Suddenly, the jobs, clothes, and lifestyle Casey craves represent issues of class and assimilation. Shelly Frasier's adept reading of this thoughtful audiobook eloquently raises questions about American social strata much in the way Eliot's work did in nineteenth-century England. Casey is a well-educated girl from a modest immigrant family who is constantly aware of the cultural differences that comprise her life. Frasier keeps Casey honest with her no-nonsense performance. L.B.F. (c) AudioFile 2007, Portland, Maine

January 22, 2007
In her noteworthy debut, Lee filters through a lively postfeminist perspective a tale of first-generation immigrants stuck between stodgy parents and the hip new world. Lee's heroine, 22-year-old Casey Han, graduates magna cum laude in economics from Princeton with a taste for expensive clothes and an "enviable golf handicap," but hasn't found a "real" job yet, so her father kicks her out of his house. She heads to her white boyfriend's apartment only to find him in bed with two sorority girls. Next stop: running up her credit card at the Carlyle Hotel in New York City. Casey's luck turns after a chance encounter with Ella Shim, an old acquaintance. Ella gives Casey a place to stay, while Ella's fiancé gets Casey a "low pay, high abuse" job at his investment firm and Ella's cousin Unu becomes Casey's new romance. Lee creates a large canvas, following Casey as she shifts between jobs, careers, friends, mentors and lovers; Ella and Ted as they hit a blazingly rocky patch; and Casey's mother, Leah, as she belatedly discovers her own talents and desires. Though a first-novel timidity sometimes weakens the narrative, Lee's take on contemporary intergenerational cultural friction is wide-ranging, sympathetic and well worth reading.

March 15, 2007
Newly graduated from Princeton, twenty something Casey Han is back home with her hard-working parents in Manhattan, but the ill-tempered Casey chafes at their old-world ways and quickly moves out. In this oversized saga of New York yuppies, she spends the next four years trying to find her way, behaving badly to all who care about her and living the high life without the financial means. What could have been a fascinating study of the conflicts facing young Koreans in 1990s Americaloyalty to their families, corporate racism, and the irresistible gimme glitter lure of the sophisticated urban lifestyleis a flat footed disappointment. Over explanation of every feeling and a flood of distracting brand-name details unnecessarily pad this tale. Vulgar language, wooden dialog, and behavior both shallow and improbable leave the reader with the impression that little matters to Lee's large cast of characters but libido. The recipient of an impressive list of both fiction and nonfiction writing awards, Lee needs to find and trust her voice. Not recommended. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 1/07.]Beth E. Andersen, Ann Arbor Dist. Lib., MI

Copyright 2007 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 1, 2007
Lee mixes feminism and cultural awareness to create a sweeping story of first-generation Korean Americans finding their way between the old world and the new. Casey Han, her 22-year-old heroine, is having trouble turning her Princeton economics degree into a job. When her authoritarian father throws her out, she goes to her white boyfriend for solace only to find him with in bed with two sorority girls. Just as all looks lost, she meets a rich school acquaintance, Ella Shim, who offers her a place to stay and convinces her fianc' to help Caseyget a job. Caseys taste for expensive clothes keeps her in debt. Ellas shyness makes it easy for her husband to cheat on her. And Caseys fathers coldness makes it hard for her mother to ignore kindness from another quarter. With very broad strokes and great detail, Lee paints colorful three-dimensional characters and outlines intergenerational and cultural struggles brilliantly. There is a little first-novel shyness on some issues but nothing the rest of the narrative doesnt make up for.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2007, American Library Association.)