Review | Hope, conflict, struggle: Chinese-American experience laid bare in elegant debut novel

Number One Chinese Restaurant
by Lillian Li
Henry Holt and Co

As Lillian Li’s debut novel opens, with a scene in a Chinese restaurant in America, a group of waiters are singing Happy Birthday. They are horribly out of tune. As the song fades and the customer blows out the candle on her complimentary cheesecake, the waiters retreat to their tables, still applauding. “We need great leader,” one of them says dejectedly as their unpopular boss sits nearby.

At once darkly comical and beguiling, the chaotic scene sets the stage for a multigenerational novel whose Chinese-American characters are brought together by friendship and love, as well as their hopes, frustrations, conflicts and struggles in their place of work.

Number One Chinese Restaurant is set in the Beijing Duck House, a fictional eatery in the city of Rockville, near Washington, DC. Decorated in a deep, matte red, its walls are lined with framed photos of famous customers, including Hollywood actors, politicians and former presidents.

The restaurant is run by two brothers, Jimmy and Johnny Han, who took over after the death of their father, an immigrant from Beijing.