egon to go to college is perhaps the most poignant
reminder of the paradise lost.
A Little Too Much Is Enough had its beginning in
a writing class at Lewis and Clark College, in which
she wrote a story on “How to Cook Rice.” In inter-
views, Tyau said that she wrote the story for her
family, specifically to memorialize the stories and
experiences of her grandparents. While the novel
is not an autobiography, nor can it be read as such,
critics have noted how many of the characters in
her novel are similar to, or draw inspiration from,
several members of her family. The novel was gen-
erally well received by critics, and Tyau won a 1996
Pacific Northwest Bookseller’s Association Award,
in addition to being a finalist for the Oregon Book
Award and Barnes and Noble first book award.
Tyau’s second novel, Makai, was also well re-
ceived and was a finalist for the 2000 Oregon
Book Award. Unlike the first novel, Makai focuses
on a friendship between two Chinese-Hawaiian
women. Alice Lum is introverted and depend-
able, but her best friend Annabel Lee is outgoing
and aggressive. As they both vie for the affection
of Sammy Woo, who works for Annabel’s father’s
Chinese restaurant, Annabel appears to the win-
ner at the beginning. Eventually, however, Sammy
is attracted to Alice, and they soon get married
and move to the island of Maui. Years later, Alice
and Annabel meet again to confront the past. The
novel not only sheds light on the psychology of
Chinese-Hawaiian women but also on the cultural
landscape of Hawaii.
Bibliography
See, Carolyn. “Heaven in Small Bites,” Washington
Post, 28 July 1995, sec. B p. 2.
Tyau, Kathleen. “Author’s Notes.” In Growing Up
Local: An Anthology of Poetry and Prose from
Hawai’i, edited by Eric Chock, James R. Harstad,
Darrell H. Y. Lum and Bill Teeter. Honolulu: Bam-
boo Ridge Press, 1998.
Wilson, Rob. Reimagining the American Pacific: From
South Pacific to Bamboo Ridge and Beyond. Dur-
ham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 2000.
Jinah KimTypical American Gish Jen (1991)
GISH JEN’s first novel, Typical American, begins
with Ralph Chang’s journey in 1947 from a small
town in China to New York City, where he enrolls
in graduate school. The first chapter underscores
the mythological status of America as a land of
promise, opportunity, and dreams. Jen opens the
novel with a simple phrase, “It’s an American
story,” and ends the first chapter with a sharp con-
trast between the “dusty shops and rutted roads”
of China and the “mighty bridges” of America
where “the very air smelled of oil.” Ralph has come
for an education and hopes that the land of money
and oil will transform him into a new man. When
his big dreams collapse and he can no longer re-
turn to China due to the Communist takeover of
his country, Ralph becomes despondent and feels
caught between the two worlds, neither of which
he can claim as his own. Just at his moment of
greatest need, he meets his long-lost sister, The-
resa, who immigrated to America before him. She
introduces him to his future wife, Helen, who is
also a Chinese immigrant.
Jen focuses the novel on the processes of assimi-
lation for Ralph, Theresa, and Helen. Although the
three seemingly harbor ill feelings toward Ameri-
cans, they strive to follow the American rags-to-
riches dream of being self-made and self-reliant.
They criticize American culture and lifestyle: “typ-
ical American no-manners,” “typical American
unreliable,” “typical American no-consideration-
for-other-people,” and “typical American waste-
ful.” As the novel progresses, however, defining an
“American” becomes complicated. Ralph, Helen,
and Theresa become clichéd Americans: Ralph
becomes obsessed with money, evades the INS
and the IRS, opens his own fast-food restaurant
(“Ralph’s Chicken Palace”) and buys a house in the
suburbs; Helen partakes in a sexual affair in their
own home with Ralph’s friend and mentor, Grover
Ding; and Theresa falls in love with a married man
and American fashion.
Many aspects of the novel cohere with the
most widely discussed themes of Asian-Ameri-
can literature, such as generational and cultural
conflict, the consequences of Americanization,Typical American 295