The Palm Leaf Fan and Other Stories

From crumbling shops in Chinatown to decaying tanneries in Tangra, Kwai-yun Li's collection of linked short stories expose us to the life of a marginalized community in Calcutta. Sitting outside her shoe shop, a woman welcomes her neighbour and soon arranges a marriage or her six-year-old daughter; a woman runs a Buddhist circle and temple from her home, which handily supporting her family; during a border skirmish in the north east, Chinese mothers prepare packages for life in a concentration camp; and a gentle bookseller and his daughter disappear for his political sympathies... Engaging and detailed, The Palm Leaf Fan and Other Stories shines a revealing light on a prevously little-known community.

- Judy Fong BatesThis collection beautifully captures the lives of girls and women in the Chinese neighbourhood of Calcutta, now Kolkata, in the fifties and the sixties. The stories help us grasp the complex history of global migrations of populations, the stigmatization and oppression of minorities by modern states, and the challenges of multiculturalism.

- Arun Mukherjee, York University