The Joy Luck Club: A Novel

This book is brilliantly written from its very first paragraph to its last sentence. Its intricate storytelling and a profound study into the human condition. It will grab your heart, your psyche, and your spirit. It will make you cry, laugh, rejoice. It is one of the top best novels I have read, besides, Memoirs of A Geisha. Itnovel that relates to all women of all cultures.

I will add the disclaimer that I am adding extra stars because this was really one of the foundational books to enter into American literature that put Asian American writers on the map. That cannot be emphasized enough. Although I don't necessarily relate to a lot of the actual stories in the book, it was very interesting to be stretched to think about the different characters, extrapolating the parts that do relate to me, even if in a less-exaggerated form.

It was one of the first times I recall being able to digest media through the lens of an Asian American; it was truly eye-opening, and for that I thank Amy Tan and this novel.

And for those who are not Asian American, I wouldn't say that this book defines us as Asians, but I do think that reading this, along with other Asian titles, can give people insight into cultures that are perhaps not our own. As such, we can collectively grow to understand and appreciate the diversity that exists all around.

I loved this book!! It was great!! Amy Tan knows how to write GREAT stories!!!!!! I have read The Joy Luck Club six times!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This book can never be put down!! I love the movie!!!! THE JOY LUCK CLUB is my favorite movie in the world!! I saw the movie!! GREAT!! Wonderful movie!! You should read the book first though becasue when you read THE JOY LUCK CLUB book you will be able to follow with the movie better!! I have seen THE JOY LUCK CLUB MOVIE trillions of times and can not get tired of it!!!!!! I saw the movie first though before I knew about THE JOY LUCK CLUB book!!!! I love Asian history especially Chinese, and Japanese!! So if you love Asian history as much as me take my advice THE JOY LUCK CLUB book, and movie is for you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It will entertain you!! You will not be able to put the book down!! And when you finish the book get THE JOY LUCK CLUB movie!! YOU'LL LOVE THE JOY LUCK CLUB GUARENTEED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It is San Fransisco, 1949. In The Joy Luck Club, there are four Chinese women who get together, eat, tell stories, and play mah-jong. One of the members, Suyuan Woo, has died, and her daughter, Jing-mei Woo, is asked to take her mother's place. The club knows that when Suyuan lived in China, she had twin daughters, but they were left behind. The day when Jing-mei takes her mother's place, an auntie (family friend) reveals that Suyuan received a letter from her lost twin daughters just before she died. The auntie gives Jing-mei money so she can go to China to see her sisters. She is told to tell the sisters their mother's life story, but Jing-mei says she never really knew her. This starts the beginning of many heartwarming, heartwrenching stories of the Joy Luck Club and their American-born daughters.

The novel breaks down into chapters, each narrated by a mother or a daughter. There is a chart in the beginning saying who is who. The mothers--An-mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, Ying-ying St. Clair--all grew up in China, and there, they went through trials and tribulations that shaped their lives. Now, it is their turn to tell their stories to their daughters. The stories have a variety of elements; for example, the status of women in China, Chinese superstition and folk lore, Chinese marriages, etc. Times were tough in the beginning of the 20th century in China, and Amy Tan does a nice job of illustrating that. Tan often inserts Chinese words in "pinyin" and that adds more Chinese flavor to this book. The stories stir feelings of nostalgia in me, even though neither my parents nor I ever experienced events like those. Maybe my Chinese blood is calling to me.

Being Chinese-American myself, I can relate a lot to the Joy Luck Club's American-born daughters. They're Chinese on the outside, but American on the inside, especially the daughter who is half-Chinese. The daughers all have frustrations with their "backwards" Chinese mothers. Their mothers compare their daughters to each other. They generally do not know much about their Chinese heritages. The daughters' stories talk about growing up and learning life's lessons from their mothers, no matter how foreign and backwards they are. Even in adulthood, the mothers still influence their daughters' lives. I think Amy Tan is trying to assert that (Chinese mothers) know best, and although I hate to admit it (like the daughters), it is true...

One thing that strikes me odd is the impression that interracial marriages are not favorable. Lena St. Clair and Rose Hsu (Jordan) both marry Caucasians, and their marriages are not very happy. An Mei Hsu, Rose's mother, was never in favor of the marriage, but in the end, she helps Rose to stand up for herself in the failing marriage. Waverly Jong's outcome with her white fiance is more uplifting, but it is not enough to cease this nagging I have with the above mentioned. Maybe it is just me...

The Joy Luck Club is an excellent book, and I am surprised to read that this was Amy Tan's first book. If all first books were like this...wonderful.

This book is about the lives of Chinese women immigrants and their first-generation American daughters. We learn what it means to be Chinese through the eyes of both the mothers and the daughters. From each different perspective the reader learns how their lives have shaped how they think and view the world. When I read from the perspective of the daughters I felt like stomping my feet and screaming like a teenager over how their mothers treated them. Later when I read from the mother's perspective I was ashamed and also heart broken. I loved learning more details about the Chinese culture and experiencing the heartache that came with seeing the next generation lose some of that culture. This is an amazing read!

is not being able to read it for the first time again.
I picked this book up on a whim. It was on my freshman summer reading list and I figured 'what the heck, I don't know that much about Chinese culture'. And I was suprised.
The book is basically a bunch of linked stories about four woman and their daughters. These seven women (one of the mothers has recently died) tell two stories from their past, and for some of the daughters their present, that weave together to make one big Chinese modern fairy tale. My favorites had to be 'The Red Candle', 'Two Kinds', 'Rice Husband', and 'Magpies', but all were very good.
And even if you aren't Chinese, and don't know anything about them, Amy Tan's poetic language will basically float you through this book like a calm river. She writes with wonderful talent and I will definately be reading one of her books again, that will hopefully be just as good as this one.

A beautiful tale of a daughter learning of her mother's life before she was born, her mother's friends and their daughters, and her Chinese heritage. The women tell stories of lives once lived in a far away land, remembrances of their youth, some hard times but also wonderful memories. She begins to search for something lost that her mother never found, a wish, and wants to help finish her mother's story. A wonderful read.

At first this is just another mother-daughter book, about the generation gap and the immigrants' problems and struggle to be accepted to learn a new culture and keep their own identity. If the book was only that it would be good, but the beauty of Amy Tan's `The Joy Luck Club' is beyond that. She is not afraid of going really deeper in her novel.
Using her own background, Tan was able to build a story with a universal appeal. The main line of narrative follows he generation differences between for Chinese women who immigrated from China to USA in the 1940s. These women although being living in Western for over 40 years, somehow managed to keep their Chinese identity, history and traditions. On the other hand, her daughters are typically North American. This would bring a lot in anyone's plate to talk about, but the writer brought the daughters' and mothers' individual problems, and all they have faced that made them what and who they are.
Tan's style is nice and easy to follow, albeit there are 7 narrators in the novel, each one telling her story, and how it influence --or was influence by-- her mother's or daughter's.
You don't have to be a woman or a Chinese-American to like this book, and even identify with the characters. This is where Tan's prose reaches the universal appeal that so many writers lack of nowadays. It is an interesting book written with the heart, and also the brains.

Wow, this is an amazing tale. I absolutely could not put it down. I stayed up until I finished it, even though I had to wake up early the next morning. I cannot recall reading such a story as this, I was definitely wooed. This is a simply written bittersweet saga of four Chinese women and their daughters.
I was enchanted by these wonderful and courageous women of the East from the very beginning. I could see and hear everything that they told. Their pain was my pain. Their joy, my joy. Amy Tan has a wondrous way of opening your eyes, so that you can see into the souls of these women. Never has the hardships of such seemingly frail women affected me so. I became riveted with anticipation of more to come.
I truly loved this tale of love and woe. All I can say, is if you have not read it, do so now. You will not regret it. In fact, I am positive, that you will never forget these enchanting people ever.

Having read Nancy Friday's, "My Mother/Myself," before reading this book, and having discovered that my life mission is to guide women and girls to earn trust in themselves, I was definitely prepared for this book. Amy Tan put into several short stories, what Nancy Friday put into a pyschological guide.
Before any woman can be free to live her own life, she must understand, accept and appreciate where she begins and her mother ends, in each of their interactions.
And societal expectations can play a big impact on this challenge for all of us.
In this novel, 4 Chinese mothers, who grew up during China's war with Japan pass on that universal and unspoken rule that says that to be female is to not process your thoughts, and speak through your own voice.
I recommend everyone read this book, while you think about your own experiences, and how they compare. You will be amazed at how Ms. Tan has told your childhood story, no matter what your race or socioeconomics are.
And as you note your story, through this story, share your stories with other women and girls, so that we all benefit from knowing that we can love our mothers, while we break free of the symbiotic bond that has for too long held us back.

I read this book in AP ENGLISH class in high school, this book is a must read! Amy Tan is a great writer, the language she used in her books are simple but the real meanings behind the stories are not very easy to get. She is really brilliant in her way of writing about mother-daughter relations or generation gaps. I am a chinese myself and I also have a mother who came from china so I got a better understanding of the story. Four mothers and four daughters, they all had different stories of their own, they had different points of view at things. The daughter never understand their mothers; the mothers could not find a way for their daughters to understand them; these were all because of differences in language, thoughts of different generations, and different cultures and societies. The four mothers had went through a lot in their past, they had made great mistakes and now they're watching their daughters making the same mistakes but the daughters would not listen to their mothers' advises. This story did not just talked about gaps between chinese parents and children, it also portrayed the gaps between parents and children of different races, cultures, and societies. This is a great literature piece for anybody to read, no matter you're a mother or daughter at any age, you should read this. You won't regret reading this book.

This book is a classic and I finally got around to reading it is very much like the movie but of course much better all the characters are well thought out and gives you a sense of how different generations of mothers and daughters and cultures are.and how grief and war change people it’s a must read.

Back in Freshman year there was a short story in my 9th grade English anthology by Amy Tan. It was called The Rules of the Game. It was a great story to break into high school with because I really enjoyed it. Now I've finally had the chance to read where the story came from and I was defiantly entertained. The Joy luck club is a beautiful book with one theme, the relationship between mothers and daughters and the joys and strengths that they share. The narration's jumps between four mothers and their daughters. Real life in China and modern day life in the US. Each story has it's own plot and resolution. Weather it's a young girl in China forced to marry in an arranged marriage when she was only 12. Or a young wanna be prodigy trying to live up to her mothers expectations. There are stories about going through a divorce, living with a concubine for a mother, dealing with your mothers death, or finding secret strengths inside of yourself you never know existed.
I was very impressed with this book. My favorite stories being Waverly's and June's. Every page is entertaining and it's actually even taught me a little about Chinese culture. Everyone who's a mother or a daughter should defiantly read this book. I'm defiantly going to pick up another book by Amy Tan. The Hundred Secret Senses is on my shelf waiting to be read.

After visiting Hong Kong last Fall, I found myself entangled in Chinese culture. There were not enough movies I could see, so I started reading books too. One thing is sure about this book. Once you open its cover and start, you will find yourself so involved in on of the most beautiful inroductions ever. So the introduction carries you over and you cannot let go until you are done reading. Ms. Tan is wonderfully talented writer with a story to tell that relates to any generation. Knowing that my husband would probably not read the book by his choice (book about four women and their daugthters, was not quite a good pitch), I rented a movie and had him see it. After seeing the movie which keeps very close to the plot in the book, my husband was finally ready to read the book himself. It was the first time, in the long time, I saw him crying...I on the other hand, am ready to start another one of Ms. Tan's books. As a matter of fact, I am looking forward to it.

The Joy Luck Club is not really a novel, but a collection of 16 short stories told by four friends and their daughters. I've read this collection three times and I can never get tired of them! So real, so human, Tan's voice reaches out to your spirit. The love daughters have for their mothers, and the hatred, not hatred really just, I don't know, whatever it is that makes the mother-daughter relationship magical.
This book will change your life if you let it. Read about Suyuan, An-Mei, Ying-Ying and Lindo, the lives, the spirits they left back in China, the spirits they try to impart to and exorcise from their daughters, the longing, the hope that all immigrants have that maybe where they're going is a better place, that maybe they can forget, but they can't; they must stand up and tell their story, shout it, let everyone know that they're human. We will get better, if we listen.

This book made me laugh, cry and every emotion in between. It also made me wish I had an extended Chinese family to share their stories with me.

This group of women showed more courage in the face of overwhelming repression and tragedy than any human should be expected to do. And yet they continue to live and love, passing on the legacy of their experiences to their daughters.

Beautifully narrated; Tan paints China in images both beautiful and horrific. A must read for mothers and daughters.

The book shows the culture of the China, which the mothers grew up with totally different culture than American people. Their daughters borned in America and have totally different point of view than their mothers. They had struggle with their Chinese parents and the freedom and opportunities given to them. This book shows the readers the struggles that immigrants faced when they came to a new place and the different cultures that Chinese people had. The book is creative and very special because I never read a book like this before and it is also very interesting.

I watchted this movie about 5 years ago, and I finally got around to reading the book. And I think this is the first time I can honestly say that to me the movie was as good as the book! (shocking, I know)
This book is about 4 mothers and 4 daughters and their stories of love and loss. There's such a difference in the stories of the mothers & of their daughters, being that the mothers grew up in China & the daughters in the US. It's about their learning to appreciate and understand each other and their lives. What's nice is that in the beginning of the book there's a list of each character and of their stories. It makes it much easier when you go from story to story to remember who's who.
What I liked most about the stories was how these women took all of their circumstances and made the best they could out of their lives. Such an inspiration, when you think about how being born in China in the early 1900's was a very difficult time for women. How being born in a different country could make all the difference.

Well, actually this is more like one of the best books I've read, period. Sometimes we find it so hard to understand our loved ones' point of view, just like the Chinese-thinking mothers and their Americanized daughters depicted here. I love every story in the book, but the ones I liked best were the ones about Waverly Jong and her childhood struggles with her upstart mother; An-Mei Hsu's mother, the Fourth Wife, and her final revenge against the man that ruined her life; and Suyuan Woo's life during the war, and her Long Cherished Wish. All the stories are enthralling and wistful, and the clash of the modern, urban lifestyle of the second generation against the first's more traditional one is amazingly, beautifully described. After you've read this book you'll be left craving more, so run and get the other books by Amy Tan, which are as excellent as this one.

Having just read The Silent Girl, Tess Gerritsen's latest, with its setting in Chinatown and Chinese myths and culture, I remembered I still had two Amy Tan novels waiting on my shelf to be read. I decided to read her first one, The Joy Luck Club.

Earlier I had read another of Tan's books and liked it, but this one was a disappointment to me. It involves four women who were born in China and came to this country as adults, and their daughters. The mothers have retained their Chinese ways. They agonize over the western ways of their daughters who have been raised in the U.S. The story is told in a series of vignettes. One of my problems was that I'm not used to Chinese names so I had to keep looking back to see which person's story I was reading. At the end of the book I was still checking the names, which means of course that I wasn't involved enough to get to know them by their names.

The mothers' stories were definitely more interesting, even though the daughters had their own difficulties with their strict and suspicious mothers as they tried to assimilate with their friends and neighbors. One mother, for instance, had been widowed young in China and then tricked into becoming the fourth wife of a rich man. Her story was engrossing, and maddening for an American reader.

Amy Tan is a great writer but it amazes me that this book was the one that made her famous. Apparently it worked for other readers much more than for me. Admittedly, I found the Chinese culture fascinating, so different than what I grew up learning. Perhaps you will like it.

I liked this book so much, I'm passing it along to my teenage daughter. It will be interesting to hear her take on it!
The relationships between these mothers and daughters, which are explored from a unique cultural perspective, translate with crystal clarity. I was able to identify so well with these characters and their frustrations in trying to relate to each other - proving it doesn't take a drastic cultural gap to make your daughter (or your mother) sometimes seem strange and alien!
It wasn't a perfect novel; tjump from one character to the next at every chapter was so jolting, I was very tempted to read the book out of order. Also, the end seemed somehow unfocused - I haven't seen the movie, but the book didn't end with a pat Hollywood-style wrap-up.
Don't rush through this one to find out what happens; the pleasure is in the read itself.

The Joy Luck Club is a book that is organized in a series of vignettes. Throughout the novel 8 women (mothers and daughters) are playing mahjong for money as they feast on a great meal. As they play, each character shares stories from their past. Before the story can end another woman begins or continues with her story. The book is constantly changing storylines, but Tan makes the transitions so smoothly that they do not interupt the main line of thought. Each story contains history of China, culture, heartache, loss, frustration, bad matches in marriage, and the will and determination to thrive and strive for happiness despite the barriers that come their way.

I was motivated to read this book as I read Amy Tan's autobiography, so actually went about it the opposite way. The book is good, though I felt it had been overhyped and seemed overrated. Some of the stories are better than others, but overall, a novel read.

There are some barriers to enjoying this wonderful book. It may be hard to understand the dialogue and some of the themes if you are not Asian, and the names are important to following the story, and are all Chinese.
But beyond this, you could not imagine a better book. After I finished it, I called my mother crying. Although your mother will probably never cut flesh from her arm to feed her own dying mother, become a man's third concubine, or leave her twin babies on a path, you may read this and find a new appreciation for what she has given you.
Tan deftly manages the development of eight characters, when one seems to be overwhelming to many other authors. She tells both sides of conflicts, reaching into each character's weaknesses, and helping them find their strengths. She paints a vivid picture of modern America and a China past that is spellbinding. But best of all, she depicts love gently and fully. This core human emotion takes on new forms and dimensions under her talented pen, helping the reader to see love where it might not have been apparent.
This is a riveting insight into Asian culture. Although the term "As far as the east is from the west" can denote great distance, this book helped me to realize that my western self can be very close to my eastern mom in ways I never imagined. This book helped me understand and appreciate her more fully, and I hope you will read this book, and call your mother or guardian crying too.
Get your copy from... - always a wonderful experience!

Technically this wasn't the last book I read. I read Confessions of a Shopaholic most recently, and really liked it. I needed a light read after the last several books I've read had characters with cancer - I love heavy drama, but need an escape from reality once in a while too. Before that I'd been reading Bodily Harm by Margaret Atwood, a book I'd had forever. I'd gotten to page 186 when I found it had been bound wrong - there was a segment that repeated after page 186 and then a gap of probably 20 pages, so I got all that way and couldn't finish it. I would have exchanged it at Powell's, but wasn't really that into it anyway.

So, on to the Joy Luck Club. I tend to love books about Chinese culture and especially tales about women. This was right up my alley. The book tells the story of four sets of mothers and daughters. The mothers were all born in China and the daughters all born in America.

The book starts with the mother that started the Joy Luck Club having recently passed away. The Joy Luck Club is a gathering of four women to play mah jong (and eat, gossip, etc.). Each chapter is told from a mother or daughter's perspective. The mother's stories all tell of their past in China, and evolve into their current relationships with their daughters. The daughter's stories tell of their upbringing in the U.S. that shaped their current lives (their current relationships with their mothers, kids, husbands/lovers, their careers, etc.).

I enjoyed this book, but wouldn't say it was one of my favorites. I enjoyed Snowflower and the Secret Fan more (recently been made into a movie). I found it a bit confusing to keep track of the characters. I had to back track a lot to remember who was who. The stories were all really good on their own, although they didn't overlap as much as you'd expect. But maybe I was a little more distracted with a new baby? It may have been me, not the book.

Each of the four Chinese ladies at the Mahjong table has a story to tell. The Joy Luck Club tells the story in detail. Each arrived in America through different circumstances. Many faced poverty, arranged marriages and loss of children, family and possessions. They lived through hardships that they cannot forget. When they arrived in America, they learned to speak English and adapt to American ways although Chinese culture still dominated their lives. The Joy Luck Club is also about their daughters. The daughters are American-born Chinese and are totally different. They cannot understand their mothers and become frustrated easily by their ways.
The story is rich with detail and engages the reader in small captivating chapters. It is easy to cry as you imagine some of the pain that the mothers experienced in China. One can tell the huge generation gap among immigrant mothers and their American-born daughters more clearly after reading this book.

I read this book when I was far too young to understand the intricacies and the delicacies that are found throughout this novel. Having reread it recently , I came to a conclusion: The basic story is so simple, almost anyone could write a story of mothers and daughter, but I find it hard to believe that anyone could have written anything nearly as well as Amy Tan has. With stories about women who were strong, women who kept secrets, and even more, this book captures not only the relationships of the 8 women, but also of any mother and daughter. My mother recently payed me the same compliment that June's mother did to her. She told me that "my heart was best quality." I sincerely thank Amy Tan for writing a story which has undoubtedly made mothers and daughters connect or reconnect to each other.

I read this book for a school project and am very pleased with the overall story. The stories for each character were intriguing and kept me reading to find out what happens next.
Each daughter/mother pair has a different relationship that they are each trying to figure out. The mothers find that they have passed on their misfortunes to their daughters, while the daughters themselves are not aware of it, because of their need to rebel against their mothers. Growing up in an American society, with Chinese influences is hard for the girls, which is the reason why they do not understand their mothers' views.
The novel was an excellent quality piece and I would recommend it to almost anyone. Even some of the male population should try it out, because they might be pleasantly surprised.

Even though The Joy Luck Club was probably pretty inaccurate as far as Chinese culture, I still loved it! Few books keep me hooked the way that The Joy Luck Club did. It started out slow but got better and better until the climatic ending. I liked how every story dealt with a different aspect of the relationship between mother and daughter. It made it more interesting when the point of view was changed between the characters. The Joy Luck Club had a lot of deeper meaning and usually the people that don't like the book just can't understand it. It is very rare that I find a book I can really give 5 stars to and The Joy Luck Club deserves every single one of them. I would recommend it to basically anyone that is looking for a book with a lot of more-than-meets-the-eye meaning.

An audiobook abridged on two tapes, I absolutely adored listening to this story, even though it spends a very long time in a darker place, with kind of silent anguish that seems unable to get past the lips of the women telling their tales.

Put more simplistically, the tale is told by four mothers and four daughters, the mothers born Chinese, the daughters born American in San Francisco. The story weaves from character to character, beginning with the death of one of the mothers, and the unfolding of a story that reaches backwards into her past, and ahead to the futures of all the children, and underlines the huge gap between generations that can so easily occur between countries, ages, and cultures.

Touching, and read by the author (always my favourite), the tape kept my interest throughout, with that sort of aching soft sadness that grows - ever so slowly - into a superb sense of saved triumph.

Definitely worthwhile as a reading and/or listening experience, I'm certainly going to hunt down more Amy Tan for my own listening pleasure.

'Nathan

My daughter had to read this for her summer reading last year and I got the chance to pick it up first :)
I enjoyed so much about this story, even though the writing was a bit simplistic, I related not only to the mothers, but to the daughter as well. I felt all the needs of a mother to want only the best for her daughter by trying to teach her lessons that she has already learned, and all the frustrations of the daughters who undoubtedly thought they knew better. The stories of the mother's pasts were heartbreaking, the goals of the daughter's, inspiring, the lessons in Chinese culture more than interesting. This book pulled on my heart strings. If you're a Mom, you will really enjoy this, even with the complicated relationships, if you have a daughter, give it to her to read, she will understand how very special being a daughter is and how very much we want for our daughters.
Enjoy! Debbi

Another reviewer has compared Joy Luck Club to The Good Earth. I have read The Good Earth twice, once when I was young and again after I retired. The Good Earth is a gem, a masterpiece. Pearl Buck knew China intimately. There is nothing in Joy Luck Club to make me believe that Tan knows any more about China than I do. What I learned first and foremost from Joy Luck Club is not to waste my precious finite time on popular best sellers when there are so many great books.

Amy Tan shares with her readers the complexity of four relationships between mothers and daughters, all brought together at a mah jong table. This book reaches out to all people no matter what nationality or gender. The main point is still the same. Children often do not take the time to really know their parents, and the parents really never take the time to teach the children. In effect communication is lost, and they grow apart. Only when it is too late, do the children understand how much alike they were to their parents. If someone was lost or confused while reading this book, maybe they should wait a few years and read it again when they grow up. If they don't like the style; try writing a book with the same message and we'll review it too.

Amy Tan's first novel, The Joy Luck Club, follows the stories of four Chinese women living in America and their grown daughters. The narrator shifts in each chapter, allowing the reader a glimpse into the lives and values of each of the eight main characters. These people have led difficult lives, and kept many aspects of themselves hidden from their family members. As they explore their past and present, the reader begins to feel connected to this group of people.

Tan does a great job showing the Chinese culture and way of thinking in an interesting and creative way. Each chapter reads more like a short story. I found myself getting the characters confused near the end, as I tried to remember what else I'd already learned about them, but rather than be a nuisance it just made me want to read the book again. The characters are realistic, entertaining, and insightful.

Themes include the relationship between mothers and daughters, secrets, dignity, guilt, and what it means to be an American. It is a book I would recommend to anyone interested in a good read, multicultural families, and just a book about what it means to live life.

Even though this book can get confusing trying to match daughters to their mothers, the way it was written (a series of vignettes of the different lives of both Chinese mothers and daughters from youth to today where they all seem to melt together) was really poetic and beautiful. The Joy Luck Club showcases the timeless ups and downs (mostly generationally and culturally) between mothers and daughters . I loved how she shows that no matter what the daughters do to push their mothers away and shun their (cultural) indentities, that they cannot shake them from their bones. As mother and daughter there is an undeniable connection. This book did quite a fair share of man/marriage bashing, though, which comes off as an author's personal grudge (perhaps) because it is so repetitive throughout. But bad relationships are not the center of this novel (thank goodness because that's not the only thing that can cause rifts in families). It was a great book that can be appreciated by all mothers and daughters alike.

The Joy Luck Club provides an intriguing perspective on the experiences of four Chinese immigrants and their daughters as they struggle to relate with each other and with American culture despite generational and cultural differences.

I have sometimes heard The Joy Luck Club described as "a chick book," but I found it to contain plenty of engaging and insightful material for both male and female readers. Moreover, Amy Tan's novel helped me understand Chinese immigrants' experiences in the United States and the struggle that many immigrants face in reconciling their lofty dreams of success in America with the hard truth that not all who come to America have the easy life for which they had hoped.

It's a really touching and gripping novel about four broken-hearted women in China who went to American more than a half century before. They all suffered untolerable and great pain with their marriages and families in China because of social inequalities. It's a conincidence that the four Chinese women all married in America and each of them had a daughter. The mothers had great expectations towards their daughters, hoping them to be talented and cheerful. Yet, their daughters turned out to be the miniatures of their agonizing lives in the past. It's a novel about family love, and how motherly love helps to struggle through the difficulties each of the characters was facing.....generally speaking, it's a worth reading novel.

Although there are already alot of reviews of this book, I have to add my voice. This novel is one of my favorites of all time. I couldn't put it down. The struggles between the mothers and daughters to understand one another and relate to one another is something I can relate to, as I think many women can, even though many readers will not relate to the cultural issues. The relationship between a mother and daughter is one of humanity's most complex, and Tan does an exquisite job of capturing the dynamic. I could relate to the struggles of the four daughters to connect with and live up to the expectations of their mothers. I also loved the imagery in the novel; it is some of the most beautiful, lyrical prose I have ever had the pleasure to read. I highly reccommend this book -- it should especially appeal to women who have had complex, occassionally conflictual, relationships with their mothers.

I read this book in my sophomore year of high school when I was sixteen. I was truly amazed by the great word usage that Amy Tan was able to achieve. Being an asian-american myself, I found it very easy to relate to the four Chinese mothers and the four american daughters. But I do believe that regardless of race, color, or creed, anyone can enjoy this book and be able to appreciate the stylized story telling.
Another thing I love about this book is its format. There are four different lessons that are subdivided into four stories that are all narrated by either the American daughters or the Chinese Mothers. (If you look at the book, it's make more sense than I'm making right now.)
One of the main themes in the book is communication between generations. All the mothers really want for their daughters is for them not to lose "face" and remember where they came from. And all the daughters want is for their mothers to accept them for who they really are. This book shows how great a mother's wisdom can be even when a daughter doesn't want to hear it.
This is my favorite book of all time and I advise everyone to read it regardless of age. It's a classic and a good one for a reason. I'll end this with my favortie quotes from The Joy Luck Club: A girl is like a young tree, you must stand tall and listen to your mother standing next to you. That is the only way to grow strong and straight. But if you bend to listen to other people, you will grow crooked and weak. You will fall to the ground with the first strong wind. And then you will be like a weed, growing wild in any direction running along the ground until someone pulls you out and throws you away."

Okay, a confession... the title was just to get you to read this review. In reality, I really liked The Joy Luck Club. Although I know there must be better novels out there, simply because it seems there is always something better to read, The Joy Luck Club is one of the best reads I have had in a long time. As modern novels go, it is very positive and encouraging despite the difficult circumstances in which the characters find themselves. Furthermore, The Joy Luck Club has enhanced my understanding of mother/daughter relationships. Amazingly, it did this without being preachy or overly sentimental.

As I have understood, the top complaints about this novel are that it is too critical of the male sex and that it does not portray Chinese culture very accurately. Although I cannot speak about the accuracy of the book's portrayal of Chinese culture, not being very familiar with this topic, I can speak about the novel's portrayal of men. As a man, I do not feel that The Joy Luck Club bashes males or treats them in any way unfairly. That said, I should qualify my statement by letting my readers know that I have recently finished The Color Purple, which might affect (not to say color) my perspective on this subject. In my opinion, if Amy Tan committed any sin in this area, it would have to be the fact that she simply does not have any central male characters. It must be understood that this novel is not about men. There are several rather contemptible characters that are men, but there are also several women who come across as rather awful people. Amy Tan's purpose is not to disrespect the male gender.

The decision of whether or not to read a novel ultimately comes down to whether you think you will enjoy it or not. Unfortunately, you often have to read a novel first in order to discover if you find it enjoyable. It's kind of a catch-22. I'm sorry, but that's just the way it is. My advice is not to set up unreasonable standards for this book after hearing all the hype and glowing reviews. Instead, give this novel a chance. Sit back, relax, and enjoy a good read.

This is a powerful book about love, tragedy, and ties that bind immigrant familes. It's the story of four immigrant Chinese women and their American-born daughters. The moms arrived in San Francisco long ago as young adults, and while they love their now-adult daughters they often cannot understand them - the moms also remain reluctant to reveal parts of their tragic past in their still-beloved China. The four daughters are now in their 30's and also loving, but too Americanized to always understand their China-raised mothers. Are such sentiments universal among immigrants? We meet Lindo Jong, who'se over-bearing pride in her talented daughter Wavery creates problems. Ying-ying St. Clair left a bad husband in China, married an American out of respect but not affection, and is hurt to see her daughter Lena passively stuck in another loveless marraige. Perhaps most moving is Suyuan Woo, forced by war's circumstance to abandon baby twins in China in 1944 - if they are alive and can be located her American-born daughter Jing-mei "June" will have to meet them. This story describes the moms and the daughters, their loves, husbands, kids, careers, struggles, etc.

This powerful tale was adapted into a very good 1993 film. Many say that THE JOY LUCK CLUB is a "woman's" book, but more than a few of us guys also like it. Also highly recommended female-written books about China and family: WILD SWANS and RED CHINA BLUES.

AMY TAN---Mrs.LOUIS DeMATTEI.
2/19/1952--61 yrs old.AMY is a
BRILLANT LADY!

AMY--ONE OF THE great AMERICAN female
writers.

JOY LUCK CLUB--founded after the war--1949
in San Fran. by 4 CHINESE woman. DIMSUM-
they PLAY-MAHJONG & TALK.

story about-
4 mothers and 4 daughters-
their families lives-mis communication--
heartache AND un conditional love.

Was a 1993 film-----A GooD ReaD!

bbp 64 okc

I re-read this thoroughly enjoyable novel for my book club, having read it when it first came out several years ago. The Joy Luck Club follows 4 women born in China during the war with Japan (pre WWII) living in San Francisco and their US-born daughters. The novel moves from modern day to the telling of each of the mothers' life in China. It is a fascinating novel and hard to put down. I recommend it heartily. It is one of Amy Tan's best. The movie is also great, but read the book first.

No matter how different it could be bringing up a child, the difficulty in doing that in foreign countries, with different traditions, the blood between family members is stronger than it all, and will always come on top no matter what.
Amy Tan uses the chinese culture to perfection in demonstrating the diversity between mothers and daughters. The difference in generations, and the stubbornness and beliefs of each one.
A recommended book to read, it is easier to understand it if you are familiar with the chinese culture, but gives an excellent example to what mistakes we could fall into, and how it is so essential to learn from our experiences.
The story could get slow for a while but if you are used to Amy Tan's style you would know that it will get better.

I loved, loved this book! I had this book on my "book list" for years. I read an excerpt from a International Literature class and vowed to read the whole book. Amy Tan is a wonderful writer who penned a gorgeous novel about the relationships between mothers and daughters in a culturally confusing environment. I loved the different interaction between the mothers and daughters in this book, and although my family is strictly from the United States, I can relate to many of the generational gaps, which often separate the women. I learned in the end, if we allow ourselves, we will have a greater understanding of ourselves through our mothers.

In her novel, The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan stylistically employs imagery, flashbacks, and running motifs in order to exemplify the struggles of four mothers and four daughters as they bridge cultural and generational gaps to bond together in love. Tan's unique style mainly contrasts the different worlds in which the mothers and daughters live. It is this difference in cultures that motivates much of the action of the novel.
Tan paints the picture of the American world of the daughters who "grew up speaking only perfect English and swallowing more Coca-Cola than sorrow" (Tan 18) as compared to the Chinese world of the mothers "whose worth was measured by the loudness of her husband's belch" (Tan 18). Since the mothers and daughters come from such different backgrounds, they have trouble communicating, not only because of the obvious language barrier, but because each of the women has her own view of life that no one else can see. This blindness returns time and again in the novel as a motiv that is a source of pain to the women experiencing it. For example, one of the daughters, Rose Hsu Jordan flashes back to the image of a day in her childhood when her family friend tried hopelessly to "act like a typical American family at the beach" (Tan 122). The idea of fitting in with the Americans blinded her like "invisible specs that felew into [her] eyes and made it hard for [her] to see dangers" (Tan 122). The young Rose was so caught up in her day that she neglected her responsibility to watch her youngest brother, Bing. A dark cloud ascends over the beach as the family realizes that the ocean has taken him. They never found his body. In this case, the daughter was too involved in her own world to remember what her mother hasd asked her to do. This also connects directly into another motif in which water claims something very important to the family. This flashback is characteristic of Tan's style. Flashbacks allow her to drift through time, focusing on the different characters and cultures without disturbing the novel's flow.
So by vividly describing scenes through motifs and flashbacks, Tan is able to effectively and equally show both sides of a complex heritage. Her ability to sail seamlessly through cultural and generational boundaries by touching upon universal themes allows Tan to reveal both the yin and yang in her story. This helps her readers understand a new genre of literature in which Asian-American writers explore their backgrounds, and this proves that it is not just a passing fad, but a substantial movement in American literature that will continue to grow and mature with time.

The book had entirely lived up to my high expectations. It was a very entertaining read that I found hard to put down. Being Chinese American, I had heard much about the book before and was glad to see that the book was able to meet the hype. The reading was not very challenging and I will recommend it to my family, who I think will still greatly enjoy it even though their English is poor. However, even though the reading comes along easily, the themes and material of the book can be very deep. Certain stories of the book bring up important questions such as whether suicide is acceptable or how to react in an abusive relationship. The book has also been made into an award winning film that I'm hoping to see as soon as I get the chance. I have researched the author, Amy Tan, and it seems that her traits and history appear in many of the characters in the book, especially the daughter of the club's founder, Jing-Mei. It seems that Amy has been successful overall and is recognized as a talented author. This is hardly a surprise, considering how great The Joy Luck Club was.

I used to think Amy Tan was a pioneer for Asian Americans, but now that I am a bit older and am able to look at Joy Luck Club in a different light, I see that it is really a book written by someone with what seems to be self-loathing and hate for her own culture. All the female characters in her book were either passive and submissive china dolls, or tiger moms. I've never met such one dimensional women in real life. The Chinese men were portrayed as cruel, stingy, or completely absent as fathers or husbands. The worse is how she portrays Chinese culture itself as only backwards and superstitious.

The Joy Luck Club does not represent Asian American immigrant culture. It's a work of fiction from the mind of someone who saw her Asian identity only in a negative light and as something to escape from.

Since this is a book that some high school teachers make kids read, I think it has a lot of influence on how Asian Americans can feel about themselves growing up, and I think it has nothing but a damaging influence. You don't have to agree with me, but at the very least look at the Joy Luck Club with a critical eye. Don't believe it just because hollywood makes it pretty.

Family is one of the most important things in a persons life, and each of the ddaughter's of these four women found that out, and they may have found it out the hard way but they knew they were loved. They knew that the way they were brought up was tp protect them from the evils of their pasts, so their daughters wouldn't turn out like they did. I was moved by this brilliant and astounding story, I hope that when I have kids they know they are loved as muh as these daughters in the story knew!~
Anyway, I really enjoyed this book and the movie...I was moved to tears, and I think that if you want a nice chick book to read this is it for you! Also if you like to cry sometimes~

THis book was beautifull written and very understandable. I can even relate the mother-daughter situations to myself. Each woman told her own unique story, each with detail and feeling. If you saw the movie, then you should read this book. It goes more in depth and you can understand the story plot better. THis book is entertaining, yet with some humor, and also has passion. Each woman has their own stories, their own personalities. They learn from thier mistakes and regrets, and they pass it down from mother to daughter. Everyone can learn something from their stories. This book will touch your heart as you hear the amazing stories of the women of the Joy Luck Club.

THis book was beautifull written and very understandable. I can even relate the mother-daughter situations to myself. Each woman told her own unique story, each with detail and feeling. If you saw the movie, then you should read this book. It goes more in depth and you can understand the story plot better. THis book is entertaining, yet with some humor, and also has passion. Each woman has their own stories, their own personalities. They learn from thier mistakes and regrets, and they pass it down from mother to daughter. Everyone can learn something from their stories. This book will touch your heart as you hear the amazing stories of the women of the Joy Luck Club.

This is the story of four Chinese families that centers on the Mothers and Daughters in each unit. It reminds you that you come from somewhere and the influences of culture and family and situations makes each of us who we are. It also speaks volumes to the fact that Mothers are human beings, and definitely worth getting to know better.

The writing is wonderful! Amy Tan is very witty and engaging. She creates very vivid pictures with her words. This is an amazingly real tale that I highly recommend. No wonder it spent 9 months on the NY Times Bestseller List! The only drawback is that I would have preferred to read in trade paperback format.

The Joy Luck Club was an excellent book. It touched on an area that not many books usually discuss. It was about Chinese mothers and their American daughter's relationships. It was quite a moving story, and some of the mother's stories were quite woeful. The daughters all had hidden secrets from their mothers and the mothers vice versa. Each chapter was from the perspective of a different character who sat at the Joy Luck Club; a club where a group of women would sit, talk, and play mah jong. The daughters were to carry out the tradition.I found myself able to relate to some of the chapters with the daughters and it was such an alleviation to me that this matter had been struck with such accuracy. To me, this story was a quick relief because it pleased me to know that there was a book that touched on mother/daughter relationships in Asia.

Most everyone has heard of The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan; that is rare for a literary novel. Many readers searching for their first literary experience may choose it, reasoning that it must be one of the more accessible examples of "literary" because it is so popular. I worry that if an inveterate romance, crime or science fiction reader picks up this book, she's not going to try literary again.
If, in fact the difference between a "literary" novel and genre fiction is that literary is character-driven and not plot-driven then this book is, indeed, literary. However, many literary novels focus on character and still have plots that carry the reader in rapt attention from beginning to end.
Joy Luck will not do this. It is beautifully written. The voice is superb. There may (arguably) be no other book that gives its reader a sense of the Chinese culture in America, of the oriental mindset of many of our Asian sisters as well as this one does. It also tells stirring stories and therein lies the problem, it tells several of them.
In fact it might have been better billed as a collection of stories. There is a thread between them, but so is there in many short story collections. The thread in "Joy Luck" is not linear and it will take a conscientious reader to track the relationships between the story tellers in each chapter. If a reader unfamiliar with "literary" works should take this book as the norm, she sadly may turn away from others.
Those seeking a poignant afternoon or two of reading should consider this book. Those who might want to test literary waters might do better with a book that is more consciously aware of pacing, that leans more toward traditional narrative, say Anna Karinina by Tolstoy.
Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of "This is the Place"

This book has many different stories that weave together throughtout it, connecting several families. The first story is about Suyuan and Jing-Mei. After Suyuan died, her daughter Jing-Mei traveled to China to find her long-lost half sisters to tell them about their birth mother. Her main conflict is internal because she feels as if she barely knows her mother herself and struggles with it. Her story builds as people discourage her to go because they think people will know she is American and not Chinese. Another story focuses on Lindo, Taitai, and Waverly. When Lindo got engaged to her boyfriend, she felt as if her mother, Taitai, did not approve. Lindo gave birth to a child of her own, Waverly, and forced her to compete in chess matches and practice non-stop. The conflict in this part of the story is man vs. man because Lindo forces Waverly to be a part of something she does not like and it causes problems in their relationship. Waverly decides to purposely miss her chess match and temporarily quit playing chess to teach her mother a lesson. Ying-Ying, Clifford, and Lena are the focus of another story. Ying-Ying met Clifford, a man of English-Irish desent, and gave brith to Lena. Once she was older Lena had to translate for her mother, considiring she only knew Mandarin. The main conflict in this part of the story is internal because Ying-Ying cannot communicate with others well, and fights herself because of it. The last story is about An-Mei, Rose, and Ted. An-Mei's daughter, Rose, was married to Ted. When he asked for a divorce, she thought it was fate for them to be together but eventually realized it was not. The conflict in this story is man vs. man because their parents do not approve of their marriage, and because later they are getting a divorce. Rose refused to sign the divorce papers because Ted wanted to keep the house since he found himself another woman.
Overall I liked this book. I enjoyed how the author went into background history for each of the families before going into detail about their story. I also liked that it was based many years ago but I can still relate to it now. Another thing I really about this story was the strength that some of the characters showed. I would definitely recommend this book. This book taught me lessons about life and fate. It was understandable and relatable which made it really fun to read.

I read this book a little over a year ago for my ap english 2 class. I really
liked how it displayed the Chinese culture and values. It is basically a book of mother-daughter relationships. There are four mothers and four daughters. The mothers are Chinese women who immigrated in the United States. The daughters are Chinese-American. It shows how people (like those in the United
States) tend to take their heritage for granted and just label themselves as Americans. When in reality your heritage will always be there and when you finally except wonderful relationships and things can come out of it.

thank you for your time,
Loran

The Joy Luck Club book.
Mother's Daughters
1.Suyuan Woo 1.Jing Me "June" Woo These book talk about 4 strong women that started a The Joy Luck Club. These club started in San Francisco in
2.An-Mei Hsu 2.Rose Hsu Jordan 1949 Joy Luck Club Suyan, An-Mei Hsu, Lindo Jong and , Ying-Ying St.Clair have been member since the club
3.Lindo jong 3. Waverly Long started Suyuan Woo started it and then she met a lot of new people her house a huge where ,they are different
4.Ying-Ying St.Clair 4.Lena St.Clair room for different things people can do a lot of people came to there house in and out but these four women have not been seperated from each other they always there back to each other they had trough go a lot though. These women's and the people that came to The Joy Luck Club came from china they all came here to the United States Because they had to live china when World War I was going on because china was bom at that time Suyuan Woo had two twins in china Suyuan left with her two twins because she could not bring them anymore either was her that saved her life and live her two twins behind or her and her two twin would of died and she didn't want that it was hard for her to leave behind her two twins because she loved them very much. Later on she had another girl her name is Jing Me "June" Woo she is a really nice girl wich she took care of her mother but suyuan June's mother wanted June to be perfect a thing's but she wasent so good June alway trough that her mother never loved her but her mom did loves she just dind't know how to show it to her anyways if you wonder if Suyan ever found out about her twins no she never found out about her twins wether they were a live or not because she died June her Daughter took her spot. An-Me Hsu these women lived with her Mom's family she lived with her mom but not for long because her mom left her. Her uncle Popo told her that she was not aloud to ask about her mother never ever or mention her in there house because she had left with another man and there family never forget that about her one day she came back when she hear her mother was sick and they did know how much she would survived then after her mother came her family told her to live and she did after she saw her mother then An-mei Hsu looked at her and cryed and her mother's family told her not to go with her that if she went she would never ever could came back to there house and she didn't care she went with her mother but then the man she left with had four women and her daughter did not like that the AN-Me Hsu grow and marry a guy they had a girl her name is Rose Hsu Jordan wich she loved her very much but sometimes rose felt very lonlely and she loved these man but her mother did not approved that then Rose got mary even the her mother didn't aloud her to she loved him after a while An-Mei Hsu approved there marragied. Lindo Jong live with her mother but when she was four years old she was sold Huang Taitai they made an agreement wich the agrement said that when she was old enough she had to left her family and she did when she was 15 years old her family decide to go to the west except her she got marry with a guy that she never had met in her life then she left that marriage and got marry with another guy wich the had a daughter her name was Waverly she was perfect at everything. Ying-Ying St.Clair was marry to a man that she love so much but the man hit her and did not always was so nice to her they had a daughter her name is Lena St.Clair she was so pretty but she marry the wrong guy after her marriaged fall apart she marry a new guy and they live happy after ever and June meet her twin sister and she got to learn thing about them and they learned about june and there mother because they never meet there mother.

Human emotions remain unchanged through time and its a given that different generations who believe that their perspective of life is different and unique usually always come to a point were they discover that they are only making an interpretation of minor varitions of the same tune.
In this book most of the characters feel that the common element that define them as persons is their chinese ethnicity. However, as you read their stories a subtle veil starts to open and they perceive points of connection to their elders, other members of the family and the nation which is now theier country, which is by far wider that initially they ever imagined.

Four women, all from China started The Joy Luck Club. Amy Tan wrote The Joy Luck Club. This book tells the story of what these women went through to get out of China; it also has the stories of their daughters who are all first generation Americans. This is a fictional book, but has some real events. At some points this book is sad, but in others very funny. In one part a girl has a matchmaker who chooses who she will marry when she turns twelve, a girl who's mother kills herself to save her daughter, and all that is wrong will hopefully be right in America.
I really enjoyed this book, and I think the author was trying to show how hard it was to be a Chinese girl, growing up in a time when only men were excepted in to society. This book is wonderful and beautifully written; I defiantly suggest reading this book.

This book fully exploits the relationship between the first generation Chinese in America and the Chinese immigrants. This story often depicts the rebelliousness of the Chinese-American children towards their parents because the parents continue to hold onto their traditions. THE JOY LUCK CLUB also shows the misunderstanding the parents have towards their children's actions. After much of the book, the parents either stick to their guns or adapt to their children's decisions. All in all, this book provides a very accurate picture of the modern situation of Chinese-American children and their immigrant parents

The book has been reviewed so many times over that I'm pretty sure this'll be buried somewhere in the 500th page. But I had to write this... The Joy Luck Club is yet another example of the vibrant immigrant literature that has thrived in the melting pot called the United States. It's a remarkable book, not only for its manner of narration or its subject matter, but because every woman who reads it will be able to identify with at least a section of it, no matter which part of the world she belongs to. This should not, however, relegate this gem of a book to that much-reviled 'feminist literature' section; it's that and much more. However, it'd require a man of special sensitivity/maturity to enjoy this book as a woman would. Tan is a remarkable story-teller and she tells a remarkable story. She describes the wiles and the strength of two generations of Chinese-American women with a fascinating detachment -- and because she doesn't judge her characters, the reader is free to make what she wants of the protagonists. I picked up The Joy Luck Club because The Bonesetter's Daughter, which I wanted, wasn't available. And thank god for that -- otherwise I wouldn't know what I'd been missing.

I have to admit I saw the movie before I read the book but I was so curious I just had to get my hands on it. The book is always better right? Well I have to say I think I enjoyed the movie just as much, if not more, than the book. I guess I'm just a sucker, but what heartache! I felt every betrayal, every lie, every hopeless decision these women had to make in their families lives. If you're a woman, of any race, these books should be a rite of passage. It's so heartwrenching to see what few options these women really had, and how they had to succumb to their husbands wishes in order to keep their families together.

After letting the book sit on my shelf for more than a year, I finally decided to give The Joy Luck Club a chance. All I knew is that it had something to do with the Chinese, Amy Tan was a well regarded author, and there was a movie made of the book (which I have not seen). That's it. I didn't quite know what to expect and when I saw the chapter list, I saw that there would be multiple narrators (a technique that can work very well).
I'll be honest, I don't remember a single character name and even during the book, I had a hard time remembering which character was which. From the details provided in each chapter's narration, I knew who was talking, but I didn't know the name. The Joy Luck Club is a story of mothers and daughters. The Club itself was formed by four Chinese women who had emigrated from China to America (separately) and did not know anyone in the country. It gave them a chance to become friends and share in each other's lives. This was perhaps 40 years before the chapters dealing with their children. One of the members of the original Club died, and her daughter was invited to take her place. The Club, among other things, sits and plays Mah Jong late into the night and the game requires four players. Each member of the club and their daughters tell their own stories and the story of their parents. This reveals both how they came to be where they are and also how they view their family dynamic. Some are more satisfied with their lives than others, but in all cases the story is intelligent and interesting.
This was Amy Tan's first novel and the only one that I have read that she has written. Already I can tell that Tan is a major talent and an author from whom I look forward to reading her novels. While The Joy Luck Club will not make my "favorite novels" list, this is still a very, very good novel. Knowing what the subject matter is, if this interests you, give it a shot.

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, although very perplexing at times, is one of the most gratifying and heartwarming books I have ever read. This book explores mother-daughter relationships of four Chinese families, as these women share their struggles and triumphs, their miseries and ecstasies and their regrets and hopes.
This story begins in China where these four families, although diverse in class and stature, share the same fear of the indefinite outcome the war against the Japanese would bring upon their families. Trying desperately not to lose hope in America after escaping that war, Suyuan, along with the four other Chinese women, create the Joy Luck Club. Here, the daughters of these women learn of their mothers' painful pasts, as each women tells their story, which reflects great themes and morals.
These themes vary from quitting to coping with men in arranged or tough marriages to gaining repect from elders. Along with Tan's mesmerizing themes, her juxtapositions and ironies between the stories told by each mother and daughter bring out the many conflicts and regrets each character lives through. For instance, all stories share one specific theme that can only be uncovered by the juxtapositions and ironies used in each story: mothers want their daughters to live happier and more successful lives than themselves, however, although the mothers try to do so, the daughters always wind up becoming more or less like them. Yet, what remains the same is that all mothers have good intentions towards their daughters. Similarly, Tan's addition of culture into her novel also helps the reader to experience how difficult it is to live by the "rules" and customs of their culture without losing the repects of their parents and loved ones. Many of the characters suffer from arranged marriages or disrespecting their parents and by custom, are banished from the family, yet they must learn to live with it. Equally, her writing techniques for each story can put the reader inside the shoes of that character making each story more memorable than the last. All these themes, juxtapositions, ironies and culture, along with her unique writing style come together and result in a very powerful book for all readers with open hearts to enjoy.
However, this novel is quite lengthy and can also be very confusing if the reader does not keep track of the many characters involved in each of these stories. Any reader who is willing to take the time to read this novel will realize that it is worth it!

The Joy Luck Club was such an intricate novel. Its recurring themes of fighting one's heritage and family love truly touched me. I also enjoyed Amy Tan's diction, throwing in Chinese words that cannot be truly translated into English. Translation apparently loses some effect.
The theme of fighting one's heritage truly intrigued me, as I have never deeply looked into my own. I felt a great kinship toward Jing-Mei Woo, who felt she could not do her mother's memory justice when talking to her half-sisters in China. Jing-Mei, in her younger years, felt as though her mother expected too much of her. Her mother wanted her to be a piano prodigy. Jing-Mei resented this expectation, so sought to purposely thwart her mother's hope. She eventually gave up piano, but only after shaming her mother. Initially, she felt relief. However, in later years, Jing-Mei looked back with regret that she never truly tried. She always sought to show her mother how unimpressive her daughter was. She did not finish college, she never truly settled anywhere. It is only after her mother dies, and Jing-Mei is put in her place at the Joy Luck Club that she truly begins to understand her mother. Jing-Mei hears of her mother's tragic life before coming to America, and in the end must go pass on the memory of her mother to two sisters Jing-Mei never knew she had. And only by looking past the Americanized life she leads can she see what it means to be Chinese.

An expression of the relationships between mother, daughter, and cultural differences, Amy Tan's novel The Joy Luck Club immerses its audience in a collection of short tales. Like Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg Ohio, the literary mosaic connects several abstracts into one continuous exploration of the communal, yet separate, personal life account. Unlike Anderson's tale, Tan has organized her narratives into a coherent, immediately understandable pattern: the stories of mothers, then daughters, and finally a confrontation in the daughters' adulthood lives and the issues newly prevalent to their current situations. From the post-complete reading perspective, the observer can now step back to see the larger message Tan seems to convey through the redemption of newer generations reconciling with the older.

A quick read, the primary difficulty in interpretation being the required, constant effort to connect the names of protagonists to their specific stories.

Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club is a mix of vignettes from both mothers and daughters who formed a group to tell stories so they could spend one night forgetting about the outside world and its problems and instead gather to escape and enjoy one another's company. These meetings are aimed at lifting their spirits, forgetting about poverty, and pretending that each week was a New Year, a new start to life.

One of the problems I had with the book was the repetitive nature of the mother-daughter problem theme along with the plethora of proverbs and mysticism preached by mothers to their daughters. I appreciate that this book deals with both the cultural and generational problems which exist in the Chinese culture, but it was a little too overdone. The book became at some points a bit too melodramatic, "soap-operaish" with the marital spats and conflicts between daughters and their mother's expectations. I really felt many times like I was reading the same story over. I don't know how many more ancient secrets could possibly be revealed in the latter half of the book ,or how many more proverbs about turtles eating tears, etc can possibly be analyzed that hadn't already been covered in the first half of the book.

Still, that being said, I did enjoy some of the stories in the books. One of the stories, "Rules of the Game", about a child prodigy in chess, was thought-provoking because it focused on how much life can be like a game of chess. Waverly becomes so successful in chess that her mother begins to "show her off", using her as a means of showing her pride. At the end, Waverly has to come to terms with the idea that she and her mother have different expectations and outlooks, even though they are both from the same culture. Another tale, Lena St. Clair's "The Voice from the Walls", was also enjoyable because it had seemed to veer from the predictable. After moving to a San Francisco apartment, Lena hears the muffled sounds of fighting and arguing going on in the apartment next door at night each night. Knowing that she has many issues going on in her own life, she feels a sense of guilt when she makes eye contact with the girl who lives next door a few days later, knowing full well that she knows and can hear the fights each night. Lena comes to her own understanding of the importance of family bonding, and reconciling, when she hears the family next door crying and laughing for joy when their daughter who had been missing was found safe, and relates this to her own struggles with her mother.

Overall, this book is a decent read, but, depending on how much mother-daughter conflicts you can stomach, you may have to skip through certain stories to get to other tales that engage your interest. Amy Tan does have a great ability to write, and interweave dialogue that is realistic and paints a picture of society from the standpoint of the Chinese culture. The subject matter was just a little too long-winded, and repetitive.

I really loved this book. I have read it again and again. I am fascinated by the Chinese culture and am currently taking classes in Mandarin (Putonghua) Chinese. In my classes we study a great amount of the Chinese culture, and this novel, in my opinion, accurately portrays the Chinese way of life. I admire the Chinese people and their discipline and respect for themselves and others. The book is beautifully written, due mostly to Tan's extraordinary writing gifts. I applaud her for her efforts on creating this beautiful masterpiece. Read the book...you will love it!

I found Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club extremely easy to relate to because of the fact that mostly every story told by the women had to do with mother daughter relationships and hardships. Being a daughter myself, I understand how normal it is to be pushed into things because of tradition, as were the four daughters written about. Like your average American or Chinese family, the daughters fight their mothers every step of the way under the pretense of independence from overpowering father and father figures.
However, this brings to the fact that the book is directed more towards the female audience possibly making it harder for a male to relate as easily and decreasing overall appreciation of the book. Because a male will, unfortunately, never know the relationship a mother can have with her daughter it is impossible for him to understand this book as I, or any other woman will. The appreciation is narrowed because it cuts the possible audience in half.
Still, the incentive that the book is easy to follow is because of the extremely well rounded, developed and dynamic characters. These women that Tan has created are extremely well developed and extraordinarily believable. Her men characters of the book, however, are vapid, flat, and there merely as supporting characters.
Every aspect that Amy Tan writes about is vastly easy to relate to that it draws in almost any type of audience, some more than others. The central idea of generations holding the same cultures and traditions throughout change is often brought about. Any family or family member will realize that change is hard to deal with, and will most of the time lead to a break in convention.
Adding to this is the idea that each story builds up to the next to create a central idea Tan has set to achieve. The central idea, initially set by Tan, is accumulated by following the path drawn out by each narrator and each story. This can also support that she has very little "fluff", meaning 99% of the text has significance and helps tie together the stories.
In contrast, there was no real resolution, meaning the stories didn't follow a pattern of rising action - climax - falling action, thus not giving the book a final resolution of an overall conflict. The Joy Luck Club had the same structure throughout, giving way for much repetition. The structure consisted of sixteen small pieces that were muchly outweighed by the final product.
As said earlier, I believe an adult female reader will probably appreciate and benefit the most by reading this book, yet I would honestly recommend it to anyone who is interested in relating to other family tales and hardships.

I found this book to be highly readable and to stand as an important example of immigrant and post-immigrant fiction. The Chinese-American experience is different from the Jewish-American experience or the Irish-American experience, but they also have a great deal in common. Tan successfully portrays the younger generation's desire to conform to American ideals and the older generation's often stubborn resistance to acculturation. Somewhere in between lies a happy medium that is often not attained until a third or fourth generation.

My only gripe is not with the book itself but with the notion that this is a profound work of literature that needs to be taught in high school or even college classes. I see it as excellent popular fiction, which is a major achievement, but not as a book for the ages.

The Joy Luck Club is a story about Chinese women, playing their national game, mahjong . 4 women, Jing Mei, Waverly Jong, An Mei Hsu and Ying-Ying represent the 4 sides of a table the game is played on. Four personal stories that present the life of these women. The plot of a book is a conflict between Chinese mothers and their American-raised daughters. When one of the mothers dies, her daughter is up to fulfill her at the game. When she agrees, she begins her psychological journey through the past, such as finding out that she has a sister, told to her by the other women at the table. Every story has it’s tragedy. One is childhood psycho trauma, other one is sacrifice to migrate. Continuing on, reader uncovers each one of them, which has a heavy meaning behind; How hard it is sometimes for Chinese to immigrate ,what pain and crucifixion they go through. I believe it is a great story because it seems pointless until it is finished. When the book is finished it takes time to overcome the aftermath of this novel.

I hardly ever cry when I read a book, but I did a couple of times when I read this one, just from the tender feelings and differences between mothers and daughters. Not only did these families have the usual difficulties due to age disparity between young and old, but there was also the cultural differences between war-time China and the modern USA. Sometimes it was very funny, and it was always spellbinding to me. It made me feel closer both to Chinese people and to my mother and also my daughter, who's the same age as the daughters in this book.

This review is for the Kindle ebook format only. I have read this book in paperback and have also seen the movie and love both presentations of this story. Amy Tan is a talented storyteller. I have to speak up and say that I did not like the digital format of this book, however. The margins seem narrower than usual, even at the widest setting. Also, the justification is off and it is barely recognizable where a paragraph ends and another begins. the store, please fix this. Such lack of quality ruins the digital reading experience. I returned my Kindle copy within the 7 day return period because of the text formatting issue.

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan was a very slow read and I had a very difficult time getting into the story. What was interesting to me was that the women were so rude to one another although there were glimpses of kindness. These women lived in difficult times, indured injustice and yet they didn't support one another with graciousness. Amy Tan reveals the Chinese culture and the difficult transition from China to America. This story begs the question "How well do you really know your mother?"

I read the book and saw the movie many years ago. I still think about the stories often - I have a Chinese mom and we definitely have our "gaps". I often wonder why we did not hear stories about impossible mothers from other cultures - Asian or not; I cannot believe it's only the Chinese moms have such grip on their children.

Amy Tan was on NPR's "Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me" in July - she was funny and talked candidly about her Mom, their relationship, and her mom's reaction to " The Joy Luck Club". It's not hard to see where Amy Tan got her independent streak and literature inspirations. Read this book if you are interested to know beyond generation conflicts and cultural adjustments; read this to appreciate and understand the impact all mothers have on their daughters - explicitly and implicitly.

This novel by Amy Tan wonderfully combines a mother-daughter struggle to understand each other's worlds with the conflict that comes in an American-born child trying to understand her Chinese-born mother. The novel effectively combines the Chinese culture and the American state of mind in a series of short stories on the lives of 4 mothers and 4 daughters. The Chinese proverbs and morals are strong throughout the book. Tan also manages to put little characteristics of herself and her mother in each of the mother-daughter pairs. The mixture of stories, such as a child's mother committing suicide, a 12-year-old girl's arranged marriage, a woman losing everything and still going strong, and a young child getting a wish granted by the Moon Lady, is sure to leave any reader wanting to know more of the Chinese culture. The main difficulty in this book is remembering which of the 8 characters is the main character in each story. The struggle between one mother and daughter is repeatedly compared to a game of chess that the mother always seems to be winning. This book can get tedious towards the middle, because each of the daughters' struggles with their mothers are very similar and appear to be repeating, but the mothers' stories of their lives in China break up the monotony at the end of the book. Anyone interested in a taste of a different culture, or anyone liking a mixture of short stories is sure to like this book.

The Joy Luck Club
In The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan tells the stories of four families, the struggles of mothers and daughters. The daughters live the American dream, good education and greats jobs. The mothers, Chinese immigrants, impose their culture and background on their daughters, which results in stress in their relationships. In China the mothers all have a buried past. The daughters slowly become aware that there is more than meets the eye about their mothers.
The mothers play Mahjong together; each woman represents a wind direction. The book is like the winds, always changing direction. The mothers and daughters take turns telling their stories. The four mothers share their past and the daughters share their burden of their mothers. One mother was given away by her family to be married. She is able to find away out with her in law's weaknesses. Another mother is the daughter of a respected first wife who was widowed. Her mother is pulled though many twists and turns that end with death; after her death this daughter stands up to the man that caused her mother so much pain.
The mothers have extremely high hopes for their daughters, that they live the American dream, setting unattainable goals and high standards. One daughter is expected to learn the piano. She doesn't like it and never practices. Another Daughter is a chess champion, but decides to quit, because her mother takes credit for her wins. The mothers are trying to give the daughter what they didn't have, but at the sacrifice of their relationship with their daughter.
The daughters try relentlessly to meet their mothers' expectations. In spite of the fact that each one is successful in their own right, many years of pressure have left them with a sense of failure. One of the daughters is unhappily married and only realizes it when her mother comes to visits. The daughter reexamines her husband and herself under her mother's standards and found flaws that she can't over look. Another daughter is thirty-six and feels that she hasn't done anything with her life. She works freelance with a marketing company and is successful, but she doesn't see what she has done only what she could have done.
This book is a great tool to make you feel better about your mother. It offers interesting insight into the weird world of mothers' expectations. The mothers have a past and it affects their daughters even though they don't know the stories behind the crazy pressures.

This book is about Chinese mothers and their American-born daughters with completely different life-styles. Amy Tan does an excellent job portraying the differences the mothers and daughters have and how each one can be resolved. The Joy Luck Club also makes a reader expand their imagination by telling stories from which is told through the characters' point-of-views and experinces. A fabulous story in which morals are learned and knowledge is gained. Every mother and daughter should read this book and learn the closeness of their relationship!

The Joy Luck Club is an inspiring and moving novel by Amy Tan. It also extremely powerful because it switches in and out of many realities and time periods--always containing the love of mothers and daughters. The plot contains four Chinese women in pre-1949 China and the lives of their daughters living in California later on. Tan not only captures important moments in the lives of the daughters, but the connections to the past lives of their mothers as well. Amy Tan also does a wonderful job of using descriptive story telling; she deeply empathizes with the women and their daughters. The novel makes the reader feel like they are one with the book, almost like they're actually a part of it. Because the book is about the unique similarities and closeness between mothers and daughters, the audience for the novel would most definitely be mothers and daughters themselves. Any mother or daughter would truly appreciate the density of the two generations of intelligent and beautiful women within the book. Each page can enlighten any ready through its wisdom, pleasure, sadness, and complexity. The storytelling technique of Tan is so honest, moving, and impressive--it makes the reader wish that the book would never end. Tan uses this great element to describe the fierce love and misunderstandings which lies between the two generations of women and girls. The novel is a masterpiece, a real joy to read.

The Joy Luck Club portrays mother daughter relationships and their constant struggles. Right from the beginning Amy Tan creates a mom against daughter atmosphere, which made me choose sides. I often found myself on the side of the daughters and feeling like their mom's were meddlers and too old fashioned. As the novel develops I figure out that the mothers were the way they were because of the many struggles they experienced in their lives. In that light it is helpful the way Tan structured this novel to allow the reader to travel through the mothers' journey. I began to understand the mom's more and found on occasion to look at the daughters as inconsiderate, selfish and unwilling to give their mom's a chance.

The biggest downfall for having eight different people tell a story from their point of view is that the stories tend to blur into one. I cannot recall all the stories and assign the correct mother to it. However, each of the stories helped the reader to understand the actions the mother's took in the present were based on the actions they took or did not take in the past.

The short story format creates many different turning points for the reader. However, Jing-mei's final narration is the most significant turning point. As Jing-mei makes the journey to see her once-thought-to-be-dead twin sisters, she worries that she will not be able to tell them anything about their mother Suyuan. Once she laid eyes on her sisters the gap was bridged for Jing-mei. These two Chinese girls are her flesh and blood. By observing the sisters lives she realizes she will be able to better understand exactly who Suyuan was. All the years of feeling like her mother was a stranger will be clarified. Who Suyuan was in China is directly related to who she became once she came to the United States. This encounter helps Jing-mei come to the realization that no matter where she was born or raised, she will always have ties to her Chinese heritage. She could choose to ignore it or finally embrace it.

I knew this story was going to be amazing, since I saw part of the movie, but who knew it was going to be inspirational. I could relate to this book so much, it was scary. I could see my grandma's constant need to "out-cook" herself and friend. There was also my mother's need to brag about me and try to push me to be better. To GET that extra 3 points on the test. To BE number 1 in the class. I felt I wasn't alone with these feeling of never being good enough for my mom and not being asian enough. I just hope my mom doesn't think I'm ashamed of her, as many of the women felt in the story...

I don't claim to know whether this is an accurate representation of Chinese people or Chinese-Americans, but the book is brilliantly written.

As a daughter, I resonated with the young women's accounts of their relationships, heartaches, strains, and fierce love for their mothers. Mother/daughter relationships are shown to be complicated, and in reality, they are and always have been. To listen to the voices of the mothers- to be invited to share in their pasts was honoring. Amy Tan captures their lives in small, defining moments, which is a talent I don't come by often in my reading life.

As I read Tan's novel, I thought about my mother's relationship with me and her relationship with her mother and knew that there must have been defining moments in my mom's relationship with her mom that directed how the relationship between my mother and I would be. To know my mom has a past, memories, and moments so wrought with emotion which I was never a part of, but because of her, have become a piece of who I am, is really stunning. Tan shows this same realization in the daughters of JLC. Each daughter has a moment where she realizes how much her mother is a part of her and how important that is.

I don't believe Tan wrote the novel to show men, white or Asian, to be chauvinist and horrific people or to dispel or reaffirm stereotypes about Asians. It is a novel about mothers and daughters. The other things merely give this context. In each sequence where a woman is subjected to cruelty by a man, a mother's love or memory shows itself and strengthens the love and bond between the mother and daughter. It brings about new beginnings, new understandings, and new trusts of one to the other.

If Amy Tan lacked the accuracy and reality of Chinese relationships and people, as some believe it did, she made it up in the depth of the mother/daughter relationships she created for her readers.

I was a little confused for a few chapters trying to figure out who and what was going on. But it was worth the effort. The story was poetic, and sad, and to me haunting. It reads like to me like a series of Chinese myths in a way.
And mothers may love their daughters and daughters their mothers, but there is this disconnect between that love and other things that come between, the expectations that are never met. The secrets parents can never tell children and children never tell their parents.

This was one of our summer reading novels for junior A.P Literature. (Advanced Placement). The novel is great. It touches one's soul and has many, many life lessons. It is divided into four mothers and their four daughters, each telling their story and the stories intertwine as well. The novel in itself is a lesson of growing up, acceptance, and remembering where one came from. The question presented is- who am I? How do I blend the old with the new? Minorities like myself can relate really well to the problems of a "double life". It's great for a mother and daughter to each read. This is the only novel for school that I couldn't put down. I read it in three days.

This was the most wonderful touching book I've read in a long time. I expected it to be overly sentimental, melodramatic, and purposely out to tug the heartstrings. I was wrong on all counts. The stories of the eight women were incrediable and very real. The strength of the women of the older generations was very noble and amazing. The ignorance of the daughters on their mothers' true characters rang very true and was a little too familiar. The ending was perfect, a very fitting and moving ending to such a terrific book. Though it's not the fastest read everyone should sit down one quiet evening or on a rainy day with it and atleast give it a try.

These days in many Critical Reading examinations, passages that require the understanding of other cultures (i.e. the African-Americans and the Japanese-Americans) are often found. Entering an American college within two years myself, I asked for suggestions of books that issue cultural conflicts in America - at last, I came up with a hard-back book covered with dragons and clouds with "New York Times Bestseller list" in bold letters.
Personally with an Asian background (Korea), this book was more than engaging to my life at home and my life tangent to the western culture. Is America flawlessly opened to accept new cultures? If it wasn't for Amy Tan doing an excellent job by fitting in the billions of characteristics of her topic, beliefs, marriage values, changes in America and their life back in China, she would not have succeeded in smashing the brick of race and won her top place leaving behind many other American talented writers.
Although my interpretation and my comprehension of this book may differ to those of American readers due to my Asian background, I'm sure that the heart-touching feeling I received won't differ with any other readers of this book.
The book's title says it all. The Joy Luck Club is club where four Chinese women play the Chinese block-game "Majong" and tell stories of their own, regardless of how long the story is. One of the four women dies recently and the daughter, Jing-Mei Woo, replaces the empty spot. When Jing-Mei joins the other three women, she finds her true identity and is given with a request that her mother couldn't accomplish before death - finding her real sisters back in China, raised by her mother's first husband.
Typically, the story ends with the reunion of Jing-Mei and her sisters in China. Wait, I'm giving away the ending for a reason! The true inspiration of this book is revealed through the individual stories of each of the characters - and these stories are so peculiar and new that the value of it is beyond those of any other books in the world.
The first part of the book deals with stories of the mothers' lives back in China and to the point how they came to America. The second part, interestingly, deals with the stories of their daughters' lives in America. The mothers believe that they had raised their daughters in a westernized way, but its funny to see that there are parts where they cannot avoid forcing an aspect of Chinese culture in their daughters.
As you read the book, you will realize how old generations are getting reconstructed by the new generations. For example, there is a scene where her American boy friend's tells Jing-Mei Woo mother that her and the family's reputation might destruct because of their son's Asian background girlfriend.
The book is like a portal to another universe. The cute blend of the mothers' wants and their daughters' wants in a non-American culture gives an insight of how things are changing today.

The Joy Luck Club

This was the first book of Tan's I ever read, and it made me a fan forever after. It's a brilliant collection of interwoven stories, with a wonderful, economic, and elegant prose, that often says so much with so little (similar to some of Hermann Hesse's finest work). This has been one of my favorite books for many years and has a beautiful resonance that shines down through the years, revealing much about relationships and the distance that cultures create between those even in the same family. Heartfelt, wise, insightful, touching... there aren't enough lovely adjectives to describe it.

It is true that mothers and daughters are irreversibly bonded by blood. However, one cannot define a mother-daughter relationship simply by stating they share blood. The relationship is infinitely more complex and as unique as the DNA the two are bonded by. In The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, a set of mother-daughter relationships is displayed for us through the words of women, both mothers and daughters, and their lessons learned through family and well as their own imperfect existences. The stories are intriguing because they portray the women not as superhuman but as human, as flawed and pained as any person.
The relationships between the mothers and daughters in The Joy Luck Club are both cold and warm at the same time, blatantly portraying the gap in generations and the gap in American versus Chinese culture. Silence and outward disagreement surfaced often between the two. Much of the time the women seemed more like strangers or enemies than family. Lena and Ying-Ying often seemed to be closed off to one another, and Ying-Ying outwardly disappoved of Lena and Harold's marriage. The same can be said for June and Suyuan, who incited arguments over June not trying hard enough. The younger American generation barely understood the older generation, and though the American women seemed more career saavy and modern, they also seemed much less respectful. Despite a seeming gap in understanding, there was love between the mothers and daughters, but this love rarely showed all the way through to both parties. For example, Lindo cared very much about Waverly but thought that Waverly was ashamed of her, and at the same time Waverly thought that her mom was using her to fulfill her own dreams and to show off but wanted to be accepted by her. The two cared about each other, even though they often found the other one to be painful. The mothers and daughters loved each other, but both parties never seemed to be in the same frame of mind, due partially to age and partially to culture.
Tan's attention to small details in culture helps to deepen the reality of the story. In particular, there were many details and important occurrences surrounding special foods, such as the soup cooked with the flesh of An-mei's mother's arm, the poisoned dumplings that An-mei's mother ate to free her daughter, and the steamed pork dish Lindo makes and Rich dumps soy sauce over. Culture was also brought out when surrounding the treatment of women in China. The treatment of wives and widows was disturbing and yet the painful traditions that the women suffered through did not deter them from wanting to keep alive their Chinese heritage in America, particularly through the continuation of mahjongg games and the demands of obedient daughters. Adversely, the American culture showed through in the younger women in their belief in change and their strength, especially seen in Rose when she tells Ted she is keeping the house in her divorce. Culture played an important role in the lives of the women, and the understated splashes of ethnic color added to the stories the women told.
Most profound, however, was the portrayal of the women as human beings. The women were not extraordinary in the sense that they did not win medals for bravery or any sort of Nobel Prize, but despite seeming like ordinary people they had weathered much and lived to tell their sad tales. Perhaps all of us have had relationship problems or have lost someone special to us, and the stories are ones that we can easily relate with emotionally. Emotions were amplified in many of the stories, especially those of An-mei, Suyuan, Lindo, and Ying-Ying, but their sadness was one that we could understand and relate to. Also adding to the realism of the novel was that none of the women went without a serious personality flaw; Lena did not stand up for herself against Harold, Suyuan pushed for her daughter to be perfect, Lindo found fault in everyone, and so on. This made the novel more believable, and it also heightened the interest in the characters, as they were not just characters in a book but real people.

As Americans, we have developed a rich culture right down to our lifestyle and various traditions from Thanksgiving to Independence Day. If we were forced to abandon our traditions and ways of life as we entered a completely foreign country, how would we cope with such an enormous change? Four Chinese women ventured into America on their own, in the hopes of starting a new life and managed to cling onto one part of their Chinese life, the Joy Luck Club. Though these four women each came from very different backgrounds and classes, when they came to America, they were just seen as Chinese. Because there was no longer a separation of classes among these four, their paths merged as a result of their participation in the Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco. Suyuan Woo, one of the four who had come from China, asked the other three Chinese women she had met to join her in a club that she had started during the war. The original club in China consisted of four women who were forced to leave their husbands and take their children into hiding because of the war. They decided to gather once a week and feast, tell stories, and laugh into the night as if there were no war occurring around them. In America, the women who made up the new Joy Luck Club formed bonds as close as sisters and remained so as they began new families, and their children grew up with one another as close as siblings. The Joy Luck Club is a collection of short stories, arranged into chapters with an individual theme. The stories are all diverse, which keeps the book interesting, yet they still intertwine and relate to each other. Along with the chapters being in different themes, the book is grouped into four segments containing four chapters, one chapter per segment from each of either the mothers or daughters. The mothers and daughters have extremely different outlooks on life, which are shown though the chapters from their own perspective. These outlooks and different perspectives add to the depth of the cultural conflict between the American daughters and Chinese mothers. Amy Tan, born in Oakland, California, in 1952, was raised in America by Chinese parents, so the overall premise of The Joy Luck Club is not foreign to her. She is also the author of The Kitchen God's Wife and The Hundred Secret Senses. The Joy Luck Club spent nine months on the New York Times bestseller list and well deserved this honor. This book was wonderfully written with complex characters backed up by incredibly flowing dialogue, right up to the Chinese-American accent from the mothers. The enthralling cultural information regarding China was very interesting, keeping me on my toes at all times. This is one of the few books that has kept me reading, and when I was not reading, I was constantly thinking about the book and looking forward to reading it every night. The only negative aspect is that the stories get confusing at times, so I highly suggest reading it twice through, as I am planning on doing. This is an incredible book, which I would recommend to all readers.

The Joy Luck Club is about four families, linked by the "Joy Luck Club" that the mothers are members in, and their transition to life in America. The focus in this book is on the relationship between a mother and her daughter, four of them actually, and the culture shock which comes when neither parties can understand the other's culture. This leads to many misunderstandings and problems within the families, including the daughters' marriages, the mothers'constant push for their children to excel, and the ultimate reconciliation between the daughters and their mothers. Some of the scenes that drove the culture shock theme in were the differences between the daughters' marriages, which were chosen out of free will, and the mothers' marriages, which were arranged by their families. Significant differences are evident between the novel's two groups of women. Born in China and veterans of tremendous hardship and tragedy, the aging mothers daily negotiate the significant events of their current lives through a minefield of memories of their youth in China, through stories of the pride and misery that marked their lives before their immigration to America. As immigrants, they have had to make significant changes in their lives; they have been forced to unpack their personal archives of pain and loss and to reassess their ambitions. Although outwardly they are well established in their new lives, the mothers never assimilate entirely; they never acquire fluent English, never relinquish the rituals and ceremonies of their pasts, and never forgot their Chinese years. Their English-speaking daughters, by contrast, are thoroughly and indelibly American by birth, by education, and by inclination. their narratives turning on cross-cultural confusions, generational conflict, and questions of self and identity. Driven by resentment as well as fear of maternal disapproval, the daughters dismiss their mothers as "Old World fossils", and they do not attempt to conceal their irritations with their mothers' stories about life in China. As the mothers struggle to imbue their daughters with a sense of Chinese traditions, the daughters in their turn wrestle with the need to reconcile their American lives and careers with the impossible and incomprehensible expectations of their mothers whose values remain rooted in China. The result is alienation and finally silence between mothers and daughters, exacerbated by an almost unbridgeable gulf between generations. The barriers between the women do not come down until the daughters learn to listen-truly listen-to their mothers' stories and begin to come to terms with the links between those stories and their own lives. I enjoyed this book when I first read it for many reasons. Despite the main characters being females and this book being more geared towards females, I found parallels between the daughters' lives and my own by virtue of the similarities in our situations, with all of us born as first generation Asian-Americans. The push to excel, and many other things are constant in their lives as well as mine. There are not many similar books to this one, as there are relatively few minority authors, and that even fewer write about these situations. A similar book to The Joy Luck Club is Amy Tan's Hundred Secret Senses.

The four winds may change direction, and histories may shift at any given moment, but Amy Tan's, `The Joy Luck Club' remains a captivating tale about four mothers and their four daughters.
The Chinese game Mah-jong works to join the mother's together as they form the club and share the secrets and tragedies of their lives as well as their hopes and dreams for their daughters. The women in this novel struggle to bestow their daughters with the virtues of Chinese traditions and at points seem to go too far-pitting their daughters against each other and sadly living their lives through them.
Tan writes both honestly and sensitively examining the generation gap between mothers and their daughters as well as the struggles migrants face when joining other countries. `The Joy Luck Club' belongs to a genre which can only be described as realistic with characters which are both three dimensional and relatable.
The story is written through defined chapters-each dedicated to either a mother or a daughter; as they weave their histories and spin their stories.
The novel, through this chapter fragmentation, allows each character to develop, with an emphasis on the main narrative- the death of one of the members of the club. The death of Suyuan Woo results in the incorporation of her daughter Jung Mei `June' Woo into the group. June realises her mother- who died suddenly of a cerebral aneurysm - had unfinished business which leads June to face one of the biggest tragedies in her mother's life. `The Joy Luck Club' is an inspiring novel which is both moving and courageous-a definite pleasure to read.

I have never been to Asia, but I do have quite a few naturalized Asian friends. It is very obvious that the homes that they grew up in in China were very strict and their mothers had incredible expectations. While this book may not be a perfect representation of Chinese culture, it can help many Americans to understand Chinese-Americans. Stories like this also make us wonder why the United States' test scores rank almost last among industrialized nations....An entertaining, multi-faceted novel that is hard to put down!

If you have a mother, and I know you do, then there is a great possibility you will resonate with the stories of The Joy Luck Club. Be ready for the unexpected tugs at your heart and the moments when you remember fondly your childhood. Through the stories of four sets of mothers and daughters, we experience loyalty to traditions, wedding rituals, and the realization that the new generations are always different.

There is some difficulty pronouncing the names the Chinese women, but it is essential to the integrity of the book, and to the experiences these women have in Americanized San Francisco. Through the means of storytelling, the voice of each woman shares her thoughts, allowing the reader to enjoy several stories quilted into one. The final heart warming story is of the reuniting of three sisters who had never met, yet they all see their one mother in each other.

I am privileged to have a close Chinese friend whose extended family lives in Chinatown of San Francisco, and while attending the annual Chinese New Year parade one year, we dined with several of her aunts and uncles, who found everything hilariously funny at my (non-Asian) expense and ordered the traditional chicken feet and other cultural delicacies. I am embarrassed to say I only ate rice for that entire meal. Chicken feet and human flesh in soup are merely a taste of what you will find in Amy Tan's book. Enjoy.

This book captures the Chinese spirit of the American dream. Writen beautifully, as the memoir of a group of friends and family whose journey takes you through their lives, past and present. I felt as if I was walking with each character, as they poured out their hearts and souls to me, of their struggles, their lives, and their hopes.

In Amy Tan's novel, The Joy Luck Club, she uses mystic realism, Chinese traditions, Chinese superstitions, and four different mother-daughter relationships in order to convey the lifestyles of Chinese women living both in traditional China and in modern America. The mothers tell their daughters stories of their many sacrifices and vast oppression when they lived in China. The use of familiar Chinese traditions, such as arranged marriages, and involving the feelings of the woman getting married, helps to emphasize the expected role of the submissive Chinese wife in those times. By using mystic realism in selected chapters, Tan presents more Chinese culture and superstitions. All the mothers, being raised in China, are accustomed to the superstitious stories passed through generations as warnings to various things, especially outspoken women. The women and their daughters all interact differently throughout the stories. All have respect for their mothers, even though they do not understand each other, which also presents the theme of Chinese tradition evident throughout the novel. The mothers and daughters are often in tension because of the vast differences in their cultures. The mothers believe their daughters are materialistic and busy, while the daughters believe their mothers are homely and old-fashioned. Chinese women have always been expected to stand in the background and observe rather than participate in life, until these families move to America. When they have Chinese-American daughters who have opinions and disobey their parents, they become distant from their family and culture. Tan effectively portrays the expected roles of traditional and modern Chinese women through the use of Chinese traditions and superstitions shown in the relationships of four Chinese mothers and their daughters.

This is the story of 4 Chinese mothers and their daughters.
The mothers all grew up in China, listening to stories of spirits, dragons, etc and being brought up on the principles of Chinese mysticism.
The daughters grew up in California, USA, where American practicality and christian ideals were at direct conflict with the way the mothers were raised.
The mothers what the best for their daughters. They want their children to grow up with Chinese character under American circumstances (seeing how America is much more liberal than China during this time).
The end result is a semi-interesting novel about personal experiences and the life lessons they brought. All in all, I thought it wasn't THAT great. I certainly would not read this story again for many, many years.

Amy Tan's novel has much to offer the reader in search of a Chinese American family story. There is nothing mundane or ordinary about the stories of familial friends whose lives are woven together. Each family years to pass down their history, particularly the mothers to their daughters. And that is what makes this novel so special. The history of each family belongs to the women of the novel and it is their duty to pass down this knowledge to their daughters. But the daughters are not so receptive as the mothers hope them to be.

The daughters do not embrace this knowledge as the mothers hope but instead turn away from their Chinese heritage. The daughters attempt to assimilate but as they do hurt their mothers who hold their cultural traditions dear to their heart.

And what exactly does mean? The daughters are expected to live up to their parents expectations and their cultural traditions. From mother to daughter, each woman has her own special way of understanding and uplifting that which is important in her family such as cultural obligations and duties.

The women of the family pass down what is dear from mother to daughter but the stories are never completely told and just an inkling of understanding is left for the reader. That is what makes their life stories, tragic and loving, so important. It is the mother's duty to tell story and to pass down her history.

Every woman should read this book: mothers, daughters, aunts, wives, it touches a chord with what it means to be female in an often hostile world. The choices and consequences these women face prove again that the "weaker" sex is often stronger and braver than any warrior could ever imagine.

Listening to the compilation of the best songs of your favorite artist is just like reading this magnificent book - infatuating,
stimulating and fascinating.The Joy Luck Club is a compilation of 16 beautifully titled chapters about the stories of 4 mothers and 4 daughters.Shadows from the past of those mothers were revealed when they observed the contemporary lifestyle of their American-born daughters.The reminiscence of their history in China will make you tend to your seat and listen to what Amy Tan has to say in this book from the beginning until the end.
Tan has made mother and daughter her own subject in this wonderful book and it works magically through an important aspect- love.
This book will inspire you with intense fondness.The story has stayed in my mind for a long time - like air and dust- inseparable.This is the first novel by Amy Tan,the best of hers and the most unforgettable novel I've ever read.

Cleaning out the book shelves I came across my old copy. Couldn't resist a reread. Fyi the book is 10 times better then the movie. I still love the story but I kept wishing I could make the print larger. My kindle has spoiled me.

In some ways it seems redundant to add to the other reviews of this book-- but I recently revisited it, having read it over ten years ago, and was reminded of why I loved it the first time. The structure of Tan's narrative-- going back & forth between time lines and mother/daughter stories-- made it more interesting. The way women repeat the mistakes of our mothers if we do not know them, the way women are taught (not just in Chinese American but all American) to keep disappointment to yourself-- all of these themes rang true for me, too.

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan tells an ancient, yet meaningful story about four mothers and daughters. The mothers all come from China as immigrants to America, in the hope that they can forget their sorrowful pasts and plant their future hopes in America. The four daughters grow up as Chinese Americans, their hair and faces look Chinese, but inside they are Americans. To their mothers, they have lost the Chinese spirit. The four families meet each week to play mahjong and have meals together; they call it The Joy Luck Club. However, when one of its members is dead, Ying-ying, the daughters is asked to replace her mother's position in The Joy Luck Club. At a weekly gathering, a secret of Ying-ying's mother is revealed. Through the members of the Joy Luck Club, Ying-ying could finally trace her mother's Chinese spirit back. The way Amy Tan tells the story is really unique, the whole book is made up of numerous short stories by the mothers and the daughters. The author does a great job on narrating the struggle and pain behind each woman's back, and the misunderstandings between the mothers and the daughters waiting to be solved. As mentioned in the book, the mothers hope that their daughters can be raised in American circumstances with Chinese spirit, but their American born daughters seem to forget their roots. I can relate myself to the daughters in the book, because our mothers all have the same hopes and thoughts for their children to be successful. And sometimes her intentions put me under a lot of pressure, and I feel that my mother just wants to criticize everything I like. But after reading the book, I somehow realize that it's my mother's way of telling her own story and her spirit given by her mother. On my way reading the book, I actually get confused by the characters because there are eight of them, and it is hard to keep track of all the names though I enjoyed it a lot. I highly recommend this book to everyone who's interested in Chinese culture and traditions, or anyone who has been struggled to understand the mother-daughter relationship.

Overall I think this was a good book. This book is a collection of short stories arranged into chapters with individual themes. The stories are all different but they all relate to each other, which keeps the book interesting. The book is divided into four parts; each part has four chapters, one chapter per part from either the mothers or daughters. They all have various perspectives on life, which they express in their chapter. It had great ideas and showed Chinese and American culture very well. However, the wording could have been better by making it less complex. All four mothers' stories blended together because of their daughters' age and common background, this was shown in a simple way. This made it easier to understand their relationships and stories. The contrast between Chinese suffering and strength and American ease and unhappiness was vividly illustrated in this book. Almost anyone can relate to this book but not everyone can understand it, so I recommend that you should read this book but you should wait until you can understand it. You will get a lot more out of this book that way.

Overall I think this was a good book. This book is a collection of short stories arranged into chapters with individual themes. The stories are all different but they all relate to each other, which keeps the book interesting. The book is divided into four parts; each part has four chapters, one chapter per part from either the mothers or daughters. They all have various perspectives on life, which they express in their chapter. It had great ideas and showed Chinese and American culture very well. However, the wording could have been better by making it less complex. All four mothers' stories blended together because of their daughters' age and common background, this was shown in a simple way. This made it easier to understand their relationships and stories. The contrast between Chinese suffering and strength and American ease and unhappiness was vividly illustrated in this book. Almost anyone can relate to this book but not everyone can understand it, so I recommend that you should read this book but you should wait until you can understand it. You will get a lot more out of this book that way.

I just recently finished reading one of your novels titled the Joy Luck club. My stepmother recommended it saying I would enjoy it. I can honestly say it was one of the hardest books to put down. The only reason I did put it down was becuase it was late at night and I had to go to school the next day. I myself enjoy readin short stories. On of many great things about thsi book is that many women can relate to it. The way you use detail is absoultly amazing. Sometimes you feel so connected and lost in the book that is it is like you are actually in the book yourself. This is a rare and mesmerizing novel that describes the love and misunderstanding that lies between two generations. Any women can connect herself to June in the story. She is a second generation chinese women who was raised in america. Because all the stories are different you get the feel of what it was like being raised in china over 50 years ago. This is a great novel for anyone who enjoys reading stories based on actual historical eevents. I did not know a thing about any of the strugglesthat women had to deal with. I also didnt know anything abuot men being able to have more than one wife and the wives being called wife#1 and wifew#. It is also nice to read a novel about a mother and daughter relationship. I would recommend this to any women, who enjoys short stories, interested in the culture and history of china, or anyone who would just like to sit down one night and read a great book

The Joy Luck Club is the story about four mothers and four daughters; four Chinese and four ABC (America born Chinese). Being a Chinese, The mothers passed their Chinese heritage to their daughters. The plot is not strong but you can compose the whole story by the different narration of the caractors. The insight about the conflict of culture in not quite in depth, but that is enough if you just want entertainment. It can be a preparatry reading of another book Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kington

Amy Tan's novel deals with the trying mother-daughter relationships and their search for their own identity. There are eight characters lives chronicled in the story, four mothers and four daughters. Although the novel is centered around these four Chinese families, the Woos', the Hsus', the Jongs', and the St. Clairs', it is a story all cultures can relate to. The book is divided into four sections, the first introduces and gives background of the mothers, the second develops the daughters, and the third and the fourth sections continue the different stories. The book is a series of flashbacks that take place in both China and America in both the mothers and daughter's lives. It all begins with the death of mother, Suyuan Woo, and the empty spot she leaves at the mah jog (a game her mother invented) table. Her daughter, Jing-mei "June" Woo, is asked to fill the vacancy and learns of the sisters she has in China that her mother had to leave behind many years before. June has to decide whether she can go and tell them of a mother they can barely remember because she knows this is how her mother would have wanted it. The book is about self-discovery and about the characters being able to define by themselves who they want to be instead of conforming. Chinese customs, beliefs, and superstitions are found throughout the novel most often spoken by the mothers. They find their Chinese culture a source of pride and do not want to learn the American ways. Their strong Chinese ways and their daughters' persistence to follow the American ways builds a wall between them and keeps them from having the relationship they all long for. The book is about breaking down the wall and going back to their roots, but the question is can these diverse families find a common bond and share the love they've held back. The reader gets a first person point of view from each character in the telling of her story and therfore, a futher understanding of why each woman is the way she is. The one trouble spot with the book is the jump from character to character. If your not careful you could be lost before you realize. It takes a second as you're reading to remember which character you're reading about and the facts surrounding her life. The confusion should only last temporarily because each woman has a memorable story full of trials and tribulations. The book makes you want to hug your mom, tell her you love her, and develop a better relationship with such a wonderful lady. _The Joy Luck Club_ is a moving, heartfelt novel that captures your attention and emotions until the very end.

...it makes up stories about Asian culture. For instance, Tan describes how a women's worth is measured by the "loudness of her husband's belch." Where in Chinese history or Chinese literature or Chinese culture do you have Chinese men measuring the worth of women by how well they feed them? Speaking of food, Tan describes a story about a duck that wants to be a swan [this is obviously the Ugly Duckling influence (a Western influence)]. Chinese people eat ducks. If you go around San Fran Chinatown and look through some of the restaurants, you'll notice cooked ducks on display for food. Swans signify romantic love because the Chinese admire how they mate for life. Sure, the novel is good (structurally) and it does help feminist causes and such, but why do it in spite of my culture? To me, it's not fair.

The stories of four Chinese women and their American-born daughters, The Joy Luck Club was a very intriguing and interesting examination into the Chinese culture as well as a reminder that love, loyalty, friendship and compassion know no cultural boundaries or constraints. Author Amy Tan did a remarkable job of telling the stories of these fascinating women - shadows in their own culture, but yet dynamic and captivating on paper. Tan told the stories of struggle and hardship, but each journey also had its victories and success along the way. While four daughters grew in their understanding and appreciation for their mothers, I also grew in my own understanding and appreciation for the Chinese culture and for those immigrants who have made the difficult transition from one culture to my own here in America.

As a Christian, I was intrigued how the book dealt with the universal issues of family, love, purpose and meaning. I found the book honest about the hardships created by a culture shaped without an appreciation for the equality of women - the pain is real even if it is not allowed to be expressed or shown publicly. I loved how the book valued the role and influence of the family and also showed the difference between the Chinese and American concepts of this institution. I also appreciated how this book dealt honestly with disappointment and disillusionment - especially from a lack of understanding between generations and cultures. It's hard to imagine the hardships faced by Chinese women seeking to pass on their rich cultural traditions to their daughters here in the US - Tan did a great job showing the tug of war waged between old and new, Chinese and American in the lives of her characters.

The "Joy Luck Club" was made by a group of women from China who all shared upsetting pasts. The club was started with the purpose of improving their spirits. Throughout The Joy Luck Club food is used to symbolize numerous things. Food is used to represent the actual Joy Luck Club, to symbolize Chinese culture and tradition, and to signify relationships. When the Joy Luck Club meets, the members are only allowed to think cheerful thoughts and say positive things while playing a rousing game of mah-jongg. All of the women need this club because they have had horrible pasts with incredibly tragic things happening to each of them. The women agree to bring food to each of their meetings and, at the beginning, it is merely rotten oranges and flavorless dumplings. Though the food may be unappetizing, the women in the Joy Luck Club don't acknowledge it and declare the food to be magnificent. This is because the point of the Joy Luck Club is only to think sanguinely and not worry about what you do not have or the terrible things going on in the world. Food also wonderfully symbolizes Chinese culture and tradition.

What a wonderful message this books gives. There are many horrible things that happen in life, spending time with friends and having fun should be cherished. For many these times are what is best in life. Friendship and food are often overlooked. Think of all the food choices you have today, the varieties are endless. Friends can also be made everyday, although most of use don't take the opportunity to meet new people everyday. Cherish what you have...

The Joy Luck Club is a wonderful blend of Chinese history and American lifestyle shown through the eyes of four mothers and four daughters. Intertwined by the club, the eight women share their stories of childhood, adulthood, and the life in between. Amy Tan uses charactersÕ memories to take the readers back to past experiences and pains, vividly displaying the differences in Chinese and American customs. The daughters donÕt understand many of the things that their mothers are worried about. Things like a slightly tilted house, or a wobbly table are not among the things that the daughters find important; as Chinese women, though, these are critical observations to their mothers. Miscommunication brings conflicts and confusion into the story many times. In one of the families, the mother marries an American man. He often doesnÕt know what his wife has just said because she mostly speaks in Chinese. In other situations, too, the daughters translate for their mothers who donÕt know the English word. This only widens the gap between mother and daughter. With age, some of the gaps were bridged. As children, the girls saw their mothers as confusing, and sometimes paranoid. The mothers saw thier children as disobedient Chinese girls who were rejecting their heritage, and not as growing American citizens. They soon realized that the other one was only expressing what they had learned from where they grew up. While the mothers want their daughters to be happy in America, they also refuse to let them forget their Chinese heritage. Amy TanÕs Joy Luck Club is simple and straightforward, but donÕt let it stop you: through this simplicity lies undetected meanings, bringing mystery to the characters and complexity to the book.

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan is an extraordinary book that exhibits the spirit of the heart through about ten short stories. Although the setup of the book can be a bit confusing, it really does add to the ambiance and feeling of the story. Having the book split up also makes it a very easy read. I really enjoyed this story because it has to do with different types of mother-daughter relationships. The novel acts as an insight into a world that the reader would normally never get to see. You get to read all about what the mothers know about life and what the daughters think they know about life. In a sense the reader becomes involved in the story because we get to find out secretes at the same time the characters in the book discover them. This is also a very good book because it has a very personal and unique style. Not many writers can have so many different little stories in one book and still keep a sense of congruity flowing through it. Tan uses a mix of Asian and American terminology to give the story a feeling of authenticity and realness. However this book is not for everyone. Men would definitely not enjoy it because they would have trouble relating to it. Since this story is all about what women feel men would not be able to understand and comprehend many of the view's Tan relates in her stories. Overall this is a wonderful book because of the sense of realness it possesses. I was able to really picture the events that are described really happening to someone. It is an extraordinary story that can be understood by many people no matter their age or race.
P.S. The move does not give the book justice, but it still does a very good job. So if you have seen the movie and have not read the book you really need to read it because you don't know what you are missing!

There is an indescribable dimension of powerful stories, lessons. and morals that can be learned and greatly appreciated from The Joy Luck Club. This story is about women's struggles and triumphs, their saddness and joy, and their regrets and hopes. It is a story of achieving success and the American Dream. It is about the powerful relationship existing between mothers and their daughters. This book has many valuable lessons to offer those who read it. It is filled with everyday issues that the youth of today deals with. The generation gaps between parent and child and the history and culture of two different countries make this book very powerful to its readers. This book is full of wisdom embedded into every page, unraveling a beautifully written story. So much is passed down from generation to generation, and each daughter in the story becomes a stronger person through her mothers' past. This book stresses the importance of learning from others' pasts. I enjoyed this book. I applied it to my life and it made me realize how much I have to learn from my mother and from my grandmother. This book teaches life lessons and shows the reader the big picture life. It does this by showing both sides to the same story. The stories in this book are very thought provoking. This was an incredible book.

Amy Tan's novel of many voices has become required reading in high school and college contemporary literature courses - and for good reason. Its intimate look at Chinese immigrants and their children opens up a wealth of questions about cultural acclimation in a country dominated by another race. Set in San Francisco and China, the novel begins with Jing-Mei ("June"), who has been asked by her father to take her recently deceased mother's place in the Joy Luck Club, ostensibly a mah jong gathering of her mother's closest friends, but also an investment club, symbolizing the merging of the two cultures. June agrees, although she doesn't feel she makes an adequate substitute for a woman who seemed so unlike her. When her "aunties" urge June to tell her sisters, women she has never met and who were left at the side of a road in China, about her mother's life, they are troubled when she confesses that she did not know her mother except as a mother. She sees that they fear that their own daughters might not know about them, and so she impulsively promises to find her mother's long lost children and tell them about their mother. In this way, the novel sets up its structure of interrelated stories. Although the stories of June and her mother Suyuan frame the others, those of An-Mei, Rose, Lindo, Waverly, Ying-ying, and Lena are no less important.

These women and their daughters form a complicated quilt of what it means to be a Chinese-American, whether born in China or in the United States, and they highlight the difficulties of bridging two cultures. The choices each woman makes are always difficult and often heart-breaking. Students might want to explore the difference in attitude between the Chinese women and their American daughters. Other topics for discussion include comparing and contrasting the relationships; the meaning of "Chinese blood" in the context of what unfolds; whether this is a true novel or a collection of stories; the ways in which the title refers not only to the actual Joy Luck Club but to the book in general; and the use of voice to convey characterization.

This accessible, well-written first novel is not Amy Tan's most accomplished (see The Kitchen God's Wife and The Bonesetter's Daughter), but it is her most widely read. Highly recommended for a general readership.

In The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, we see the cultural differences between the lives of eight women. Four of them are mothers who grew up in China and later immigrated to the United States. The other four are their daughters who were born in America, and raised in a deep forest of American Culture, but they are nearly oblivious to their mothers' mysterious pasts. Tan Focuses on the vast differences between Chinese and American Culture, which focuses deeply on the generation gap between mother and daughter. The mothers all have stories to tell. Usually, they have to do with honor, and tradition, whereas all that the daughters care about is men, money, and "ice cream." The mothers and daughters often have their fights or conflicts about how things should be done or treated. It is a story that many women and their mothers relate to. Even though they are different in many ways, the mothers and daughters are very much alike. It just takes a little bit of communication, cultural bridge walking, and an exclusive thing called The Joy Luck Club for them to realize it. We recommend The Joy Luck Club to anyone who likes to read about different cultures, mothers and daughters, or to people who just want to read a good book. We guarantee you a variety of emotions when you read The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan.

Through the stories of these Chinese immigrant women and their daughters, Amy Tan gives us a story that everyone can access: the story of the past and the future meeting in the present through the relationships of parents with children. I was astonished to find my own view of my relationship with my parents changing as I read the book. I found I could actually understand better where my parents were coming from. Now that's a powerful book to convey that sort of universality!

"In America I will have a daughter just like me. But over there nobody will say her worth is measured by the loudness of her husband's belch. Over there nobody will look down on her, because I will make her speak only perfect American English. And over there she will always be too full to swallow any sorrow." This was one of the many thoughts that four Chinese women had when coming to America. They all came looking for a better life and a better future.
This book takes place in San Francisco around the 1970's. The four women from China, Suyuan Woo, An-mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, and Ying-ying St. Clair, form the Joy Luck Club. The Joy Luck Club is a gathering of four women, and each week, one of them hosts a party to raise money and they eat special foods that bring good luck. Then they would play mah jong and whoever won got the money. This was their way of keeping their spirits up through their hardships. This was also what brought Jing-mei "June" Woo, Rose Hsu Jordan, Waverly Jong, and Lena St. Clair, together.
A problem that they all share is that since the mothers were born in China and the daughters were born in America, there is more of an inability for them to communicate with each other. The mothers have the tragedies of their childhoods in China in their memories, and the daughters have lived safe and comfortable lives when they were children. This difference in background also helped in the lack of understanding between them. Throughout the novel, all of them recall events in their lives and the lessons they learned from those events or from the people around them. They recall big turning points in their lives that changed them and helped to make them the people they are today. In recalling these events and the lessons they learned, they deal with similar problems in their present day lives and grow as individuals.
This book was very well written and it is a good example of how people can learn from the past. No one should dismiss this book because they think that it's a book for Asian people to read. The relationship between the mother and the daughter and the lessons they learn can be applied to any culture. The book was a little hard to follow at first because it jumps around to different people a few times and it's easy to get the people and the stories confused. Something that might help is stopping before each chapter and looking back at the previous stories as a reminder of what else has happened to the person in their life and to help keep the individual's stories separated. Also, look at their mother's/daughter's story to help tie that family's history together.
The author did a great job of tying the different stories together. Each person's story was different enough to keep the reader interested and allow them to discover new things, but they were also similar enough to make sure that the stories related to each other and helped to achieve the same purpose. From reading this book, a person could take the things that the characters learned and apply it to their own life. A person could also gain a little more understanding of another culture and also the differences between two generations.

The power of storytelling is a very significant and prevalent theme in the Joy Luck Club, which is most likely used because of the barriers between Chinese and American cultures and language, poignantly evidenced in the stories of mothers and daughters. Storytelling is used to communicate love, pride, self, history, and family history. The exchanging of stories helps control fate as well, as mothers can encourage independence, forge identity, and yet retain their own legacy in their daughters' own lives.

Each vignette is a fascinating story in and of itself that weaves the reader into the created world and into the midst of four daughters and four mothers. No one story is more or less important than another, and the structure of the interrelated stories is just as important as the voices in each tale. There is a fascinating tension and bond in these relationships that will be heartwarming for mothers and daughters alike, and a compelling read for every one else. Whether this book is a novel or a collection of stories is up for interpretation, but the accomplishment of Tan's writing is fairly recognizable. Tan is an excellent story teller that has woven together a painful and beautiful picture of the poignant mother-daughter relationship, told through the lens of the dynamic Chinese-American culture. Conflict, confusion, and delight abounds.

The Joy Luck Club is a beautiful book about, as you can tell from the other reviews, the relationships between four Chinese women (Suyuan, Lindo, An-mei, and Ying-Ying) and their American daughters (Jing-mei, Waverly, Rose, and Lena- respectively). In the beginning, Suyuan has died, and her daughter is now to take her place in the little "club" her mother and these other women have formed. She has also found her long lost half sisters in China (left behind by her mother 20-35 years ago), who are expecting to see their mother come to China to see them, for they do not know that she has died. As each of the women see Jing-mei try to think of a way to break it to her sisters that their mother has died, their stories begin to unravel, as well as their daughters'. Lindo was seperated from her mother at the age of 12 to be wed to a mean, teasing husband and in the process, a cruel, unrelenting mother in law, but escapes the marraige cleverly. An-mei leaves her grandmother's house to go to her mother's husband's house, where she is 4rth wife and looked down upon. Ying-Ying was abandoned by her husband and became severly depressed. Suyuan had to leave her two baby daughters on the side of the road in hopes that someone would find them because she tought she would die while running away from the Japanese. They all came to America, in hopes of raising daughters free from sorrow. The result was daughters who did not understand their mothers' tribulations and sorrows and now make the same mistakes, and in some cases, have become their mothers. Beautifully written in soft but powerful words, I recommend this book to anyone. Trust me, it's not just any mother daughter book.

For our Spanish class we got an assignment to read a book about another culture. So I went to the library and I picked up "The Joy Luck Club" because I thought it would be interesting to read. Well I was right. "The Joy Luck Club" is about a group of four women, their four daughters, and their families. The four women where brought together at a table where they play mahjong, eat dim sum, and talk. Each chapter of the book tells of one of their life stories. Each woman went through hard times that not many people can cope with. Events happened to these women that nobody would expect, from killing them selves for their daughters sake, to leaving behind your two baby daughters on the road side so their mother could save them from her sickness. All Chinese women were supposed to be quiet and obedient all the time and not have their own opinions. Just do what they were told to do. When they were young they were forced into things they didn't want to do or have, like arranged marriage or playing the piano. It was not like that because they were women but because they were Chinese women and that's how they were expected to act. This book was great even though it was a little slow and hard to understand in places, it was excellent and I encourage you to read it.

This novel was an exceptional piece of literature. I have never read anything by Amy Tan before, but I can honestly state that it is one of the most beautiful and thought provoking stories I have ever read.
This story is about four Chinese mothers, who grew up during China's war with Japan, and before China became an officially Communist country, and their daughters, who grew up in America. The Joy Luck Club is a gathering of their families to celebrate life and heritage. Each of the mothers and daughters tell their own story, with the exception of Suyuan, whose story was told by her daughter because the book begins about three months after she has died. Each chapter can be looked at as a separate story, but the book still floes together beautifully. Most of the novel is set in a series of flashbacks, which give the readers an opportunity to understand the mothers, and the ways that their childhood and histories affected the decisions they made and the way that they raised their daughters. However, the mothers and the daughters have a hard time communicating with one another, and not because they do not understand each other's languages. They have a hard time communicating because the mothers and the daughters do not understand each other.
Each of the mothers has been through a very traumatic experience either as a child or as a young woman. They were all taught by their society that they were worth almost nothing, and judged "by their husband's belch." They were not valued for who they were as individuals, and each gained a sense of self-awareness because of their experiences. The readers gain insight on what life was like for these four amazing, strong, spirited women. Their daughter's stories involve the ways that their mothers raised them, and how it has affected them as adults. While their experiences are, for the most part, far less traumatic then their mother's, they have hard times as well. All of them have problems understanding their parents, who try to raise them with the same guidelines with which they were raised, but with the sense of American pride and self-worth. Nonetheless, all of the daughters interpret their mother's pressure the wrong way. They feel that they are a constant disappointment to their mothers. Unfortunately, they do not realize that their mother's constant pressure and subtleties in behavior happen because their mothers want to show them that they love them. This novel shows how important it is to know your mother, before it is too late.
One of the main themes and concepts of this wonderful novel is that you must understand your mother and your past before you can understand yourself, and that you must never doubt your own self-worth.
This novel is the most beautiful, heart-warming, and meaningful mother-daughter story that I have ever read. It explores mother-daughter relationships with heart-felt honesty and beauty, and has universal appeal. Its eloquent words and fascinating stories make it an absolute delight to read. "The Joy Luck Club" will make you laugh and cry. It may even help you understand your mother, and your other relationships as well. This novel does the best thing a novel can do; it helps you to understand the world.

I challenge you to read this book with dry eyes. In a beautiful web of joy and tragedy, Tan paints the landscape of the human soul. This book is not only a testimony to Asian- American and woman power but a beautiful story of all people.
At a powerful pace, Amy Tan catapaults from China to America, with never a dull moment. In this journey, she tells the stories of four Chinese women and their Chinese- American daughters and their "Joy Luck Club", a mah jong group. The 8 players trade off chapters, telling their tragic, beautiful tales.
We hear of the magic Moon Lady,of a concubine who kills herself to save her daughter's status, a child chess prodigy whose pride deystroys her game, of a woman forced to abandon her children and her other daughter who will soon be reunited with her lost sibings, and of how a brilliant young woman escapes her arranged marriage.
Throughout the tragedy and despair these women feel, losing everything, not understanding their mothers, not understanding their daughters, all is knit together by a web of hope. The free soul can surmount anything, and Tan's novel is a worthy read for all audiences.

Having just finished the Joy Luck Club it is a wonderful series of beautifully described stories of hope against hope, attempting to find some happiness and luck amidst the tragedy. However, apart from seeing how the book works so well for so many different readers whether appreciating the tragedy of the situation or the irony of losing one culture amidst the hope of retaining it in pursuit of a new life in a new one. Despite the undeniably harsh and mostly unavoidable 'fate' and obligation which the mothers of this story went through there is an even deeper level of this story which I am left wondering if the author herself actually understands the irony of, or whether she simply tells it as she sees it not even knowing the greatest irony of all which has been passed down to her from one generation to the next and which this generation lives out to the full - perhaps reflecting so much of the author's own ability or inability to see through the haze to what has really been shown. Particularly towards the end of the book, what really comes across strongly - beyond the metaphors and symbolism heaped layer upon layer throughout the story - is the sense that the characters do not really know, and scarcely wish to admit, their own failings. The mothers who, when they had a real choice in life, married not for love but for benefit both earlier and then later on coming to America. Others who tricked their way into people's affections for their own benefit, never mentioning that they cared for their new partner instead merely wondering why, on later reflection, they ever choose that partner - loyal and kind and supportive as he may be - then remembering they never really made that choice at all and that it was their friend in fact who told them, or that they convinced themselves that it was what 'should' happen even though there was no obligation to make that choice thus fulfilling their own prophecy and justifying it all with superstition - real or imagined. How it makes me wonder, amidst all of this double talk (e.g. the mother saying she doesn't have tiger eyes but then saying that she does and that it's merely her daughter who cannot see them, or the mother who not merely is unconcerned during the planning, as to whether she has a baby boy or baby girl in the US for the purpose of tricking her way to American citizenship but who can laugh at the prospect that it wouldn't even matter which it is as 'neither will learn to look after them in their old age'. This is the real tragedy of these stories. Not merely the past lives and the unfulfilled hope for the future but the fact that on looking for that great future for themselves and their children, they are sowing the seeds of their own all too certain downfall amidst a sea of loveless marriages and where even the children are born so that the mother can 'change her circumstances' and become an American citizen. Sure there's a justification for it but that belies the consequences which these actions create; the seeds of future loveless, meaningless relationships. None of the characters express their deep love or passion for one another, merely obligation, distrust or resentment of one another....and no wonder when they have no reason to believe they were conceived for love and joy rather than merely for function. There is also a lot of confusion in the story - and perhaps also the mind of the author, almost as if she does not know whether she feels truly Chinese but just appearing to be American on the surface or whether in fact she's truly American with just a tiny voice inside her wishing she were truly Chinese. The clever way in which these tales have been told conceals the fact that they are so riddled with self-justification - the characters having just revealed a truth but then change their story in the vain hope that their daughters will not grow up to be like them, lacking in hope and meaning and without knowing where they're truly going. As for the daughters themselves, freed from the constraints of their past they become complacent and wasteful, heaping shallow short term valuelessness on top of a deep rooted sense of not knowing what a true relationship really is, not knowing what they want from their marriages and seeming entirely 'lost' wondering even why they ever entered them in the first place. The minimal parts which these men are allowed show them yet to be giving, sharing, easily compromising and yes - with one exception - totally loyal as well! Shame that they seem to be shortchanged, being picked up and discarded through the women's inability to know where they are themselves going. Mostly though the multitude of male characters are mentioned but little more, except for those who featured strongly in the mothers' pasts - which in these women's tales means the nastier ones equating to the bitterness and tragedy of their former lives. The many others: brothers, fathers, husbands and friends are all there and perhaps at times actually appreciated a little but never truly valued and almost never truly loved. In the pursuit of their own change of circumstances - at whatever cost to themselves - these women have laid the foundation for the loss of everything they truly valued and much of the hope and real love that their children could have had. As one reviewer has already mentioned, the irony of losing their culture despite expecting their daugthers to follow it devoutly is no better shown than at the front of section one where the Swan's feather - a symbol of hope and thereby an embodied symbol of all the metaphors of Chinese culture - cannot be truly understood by their daughters until such time as the mothers can explain it in to them in their new tongue, by which time they will have grown so much apart and have so little understanding of where their mothers really came from that all true meaning of the culture and symbolism will have been lost in the 'translation' to a new culture and language. After all how can the daughters understand something which they have nothing to relate it to - if indeed it ever could have been described in terms of such a different language and culture.

Joy Luck Club tells the stories of Chinese-American women who have lived through great tradgedy and lived to tell about it. They have live through war in China, arraigned marriages, abuse, and immigration into America. They made new lives for themselves; found jobs, got married, had a family. Through it all tradition was a foundation for them. They believed in all their Chinese herritage and tried to teach their children about their history and life. This was an eye opening book. It made me look at my life more thankfully.

Have you ever imagined how your life would be if you moved from "your country" to "their country?" Amy Tan, author of The Joy Luck Club, did a fantastic job of pulling me (the reader) into the lives of four Chinese women that were affected by their "move" from China to America in the nineteen forties. The "move" later affects their daughter's choices. The minute I picked up this novel I was mesmerized with the memories shared, lessons learned, and four very different mother-daughter relationships. I enjoyed the cultural aspect of The Joy Luck Club. The game from China is the organizing principle of the book. June's mother says, "[My] idea was to have a gathering of four women, one for each corner of the mahjong table." The author clearly tells the stories of the four women and their daughter's issues. Amy Tan indicates that June benefits a great deal from this club, especially after her mother death. Naturally, daughter and mothers have their frequent disagreements. Amy Tan show this throughout the book, which creates a tone of reality. I can relate easily with the daughters in their desire to escape from parental guidence and gain freedom. Afterall, even now my mother too uses her past experiences to aid in guiding and shaping my life. I feel that I will treasure that practice and apply it to my children as well. Because of this book, I now look differently at my mother's final verdicts. In the back of my mind, as I read, I thought, if the daughters would listen to their mothers and not their uncompromising minds, they could avoid so much pain. For instance, a comments such as this, "If the lips are gone, the teeth are cold." This thought speaks clearly to me as an outsider, with truth and meaning. It makes sense, if the lips are removed, protection is not present for the teeth, therefore, the teeth will not be as they should. Applying it to The Joy Luck Club - if the daughters do not take their mothers nurturing advice their results of rebellion may end in suffering (and did). Bringing myself in the situation (as one of the daughters), I would have dealt with the issues as they did. Fortunatly, I gained wisdom instead. Applying it to my everyday life and especially my personal encounters with my mother will be rewarding. Nevertheless, the mothers in this novel have their ways of instilling an irritating feeling in their daughters, with comments such as "You want to live like mess. What I can say?" Are all moms alike? This above statement is border line to something to think about, and a guilt trip for the day. Mothers are masters at it, Amy Tan shows me examples of that and I frequently experience it with my mother. Not much reading took place before I was standing back and observing all angles of the mother-daughter issues. This is due to Amy Tan's remarkable choice of words. Although well written, this novel is a challenge to follow - meaning knowing which character is speaking from page to page. This confusion contributes to the reader's intense curiosity, which makes the read more exciting and real. Read The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, and find out what it can bring to you. I am truely rewarded for doing so.

"The Joy Luck Club" by Amy Tan is one of the best books I have ever read. It's everything that a great novel should be. The stories of the 4 mothers and their daughters is deeply moving and so fascinating. Their tales of life back in China translate so easily and the memories of these women and their daughters reactions are so interesting. This story of secrets, courage, and mother-daughter bonding is one of the best I have ever read. It's a never-ending source of literary masterpiece.

I never really took this book for more than what was written until we started study it for English Lit. It's amazing! It was already good when I read it, but after studying the stories and the way Amy Tan writes, I keep finding new things to look out for. There are symbols and deeper meanings all over the place and everything's just so amazing. You really have to look out for things, and when you find things, there is even more to read. I can read this over and over again without getting sick of it!

I think that we can all agree that sometimes it's nearly impossible to communicate with others, especially, when that person is one of your parents. If you can imagine an entire book dedicated to the miscommunication between mother and daughter, you would get The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan. Amy Tan intensely brings to life Suyuan Woo, An-mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, Ying-ying St.Clair (the mothers), Jing-Mei, Rose Hsu Jordan, Waverly Jong, and Lena St. Clair (the daughters). All of the listed mothers are Chinese Immigrants. Each voice struggles to choose between a strong Chinese heritage, and the American way of life.
Although the setting of this story take place in modern day San Francisco, each of the women tells stories. In these mini-stories, Amy Tan vividly opens your eyes. You visit places like China during WW2, a traditional Chinese wedding, or grow up as an immigrant in China Town. The author cleverly describes the setting through what the main character at the time sees. If it is a flashback, and the character is a child, you instantly see the situation through a child's eyes. The author's sense of atmosphere is also amazing. When she describes the wartime tension through Suyan Woo's eyes, you can just feel the tension and uncertainty. One portion of the book, in which I felt that the atmosphere and setting were both excellently described was when Suyan Woo was on a trail to escape a brutal fate.
"Along the way, I saw others had done the same, gradually given up hope. It was like a pathway inlaid with treasures that grew in value along the way. Bolts of fine fabric and books. Paintings of ancestors and carpenters tools. Until, one could see cages of ducklings now quiet with thirst, and later still, silver urns lying in the road, where people had been too tired to carry them for any kind of future hope."
One of the most appealing things about this book was that you got to hear from eight very unique characters, all of which you feel you can relate to. In this book, due to the number of main characters and sub-plots, there is no set protagonist and antagonist. One mother could be the villain to her daughter, but to the mother, her daughter could be the evil one. In other words, this book accurately displays real-life relationships-relationships in which we misunderstand and misjudge people. I think throughout the story, you do learn a lot about the individual characters. Yet, these characters don't really change, except for one, Jing-mei Woo. Jing-Mei, also called June, is the only daughter whose mother is no longer alive. Through this story, she learns to appreciate her mother's legacy and value the relationship that she and her mother had. She is the only one who truly changes.
Each chapter of this book seems to have its own plot, with a beginning, climax, and resolution. With each chapter you are left satisfied, but curious to learn more. What ties all of these stories together is the actual Joy Luck Club. This club was started by Suyuan Woo, who wanted to get together with three other Chinese women to play Mah Jong. The women got together each week, and remained close friends for many years. I saw frequently that people from the other families would show up in flashbacks of the other women's stories. What really keeps the story interesting is Jing-Mei's voyage to meet her sisters that were left in China many years before. This mission periodically comes up, and really completes the story. If you sit back and look at it from a different perspective, you really see the jealousy that exists between a close-knit group of friends. You see the bragging between the mothers, and a drive to be better than the rest. All this book does is take a slice out of a completely real life situation.
I found the author's writing style very refreshing. If one of the mothers was talking, the writing would be in broken English, which contributed to the character's voice. Everything about this piece made it seem real. The word choice and sentence structure varied with each character. If that particular character had high English skills, then it would be displayed by good vocabulary and sentence structure. The author held true to each individual character's voice. I felt that this author did an amazing job with flashbacks. Perhaps often flashbacks can be confusing. They certainly weren't in this case. I found the flashbacks to be necessary and crucial to the story. Amy Tan also vividly described the setting with each new setting change. With this story, you're definitely not left confused. I think the reason for having so many unique characters was to give the message that we all in some way have the same problems. With each family, and relationship, the problem was communication. Each character was struggling to be heard, just like we all are. To read this book, you would have to be a reader that is very interested in others' lives, and how we communicate with each other. This book isn't difficult, and I believe that people of all ages could read it and enjoy. With that said, I highly recommend this book. When a book makes me stop and think about how I interact with people and manage my own life, then I know it was worth the read

This book was great even though at points in the book it seemed confusing.I think if amy tan wrote the Daughters and mothers stories back to back it wouldn't be as confusing. she could of wrote one family at a time but i guess she might have had a reason for writing it that way. The book was very descriptive and sympathetic. at the beginning junes mother had to give up her too babies so she would not die next to them, because who would pick up two babies knowing that a ghost mother will follow them around.that was the best thing she could do because she did not think she could make it. The beginning just showed how much junes mother had to give up in china for a better life.All of the mothers gave up some part of their lives to better their childrens and families lives. So it was a very great book and the movie just kind of cut out some great parts of the book that they should of used to make the movie better.

Although I kept mixing up who was who (that's my problem not the flow of the book) the story was enriching and beautiful. It captured the age old issue of mother and daughter, so alike, yet so far apart. Yet love binds. I also got a peek into Chinese heritage. Thanks Amy Tan for a beautiful book.

At first the unclear wisdom and unspoken rules between the characters in the "The Joy Luck Club" was a little frustrating. But then I saw how this ambiguous wisdom reflects the ambiguity of the complex mother/daughter relationships in the book. It's an accurate portrayal of the depths of difficulty and joy found in the unavoidable link between mother and daughter. In the book, life's hardships and joys are explored through the lens of old China and modern China, and through new Chinese immigrants as well as assimilated Chinese-Americans. Through the eyes of the members and daughters of the Joy Luck Club, we see that one can try desperately to explain the past/present/future with a proverb or a riddle, but ultimately learning to have joy in the middle of whatever luck one gets is the key. One quote in the book sums it up, "Then you must teach my daughter this same lesson. How to lose your innocence but not your hope. How to laugh forever". No matter how young or old, or which culture you are from, there are lessons to be learned from the ageless mothers and daughters of "The Joy Luck Club".

The Joy Luck Club was a moving story about four Chinese women and their daughters. The stories that the mothers unravel are heartbreaking, but each one contains strong hopes for their daughters in America. I wouldn't call this book phenomenal, but I believe it is a good story with a powerful plot. Surprisingly, I thought the movie was more moving than the novel and I highly recommend the film. Overall, the book is a short, pleasing read.

The novel, The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan displays a mind-blowing plot that has topics of hardship and culture everyone could relate to. The book focuses on the struggles of four Chinese American women's journey emigrating from China to America. In America they struggle with the hardships of being illiterate and raising they're first-generation American born children, seeking to teach them the same cultural standards as they were raised upon in China. The setting takes place in San Francisco, California where the women meet each week at each other's house to play Mahjong, eat Chinese food, and share stories. The Joy Luck Club was started back in China where the main character Suyuan Woo and her group of friends at the time met together to as a way to escape and vent about the horrific war between China and Japan. They held parties each week as if it was a new year, forgetting the past wrongs condemned on them. When Suyuan immigrated to America, she had nothing but the clothes on her back and the traditions and memories of the Joy Luck Club. Feeling lost and alone in America she and her husband decided to attend church where they met other immigrants that would soon fill the three other seats of the joy luck club. Forty years after the joy luck club started Suyuan died, "just like a rabbit: quickly and with unfinished business left behind (5)," it is her daughter's (Jing-Mei) duty to fill the fourth corner of the joy luck club and fix her mothers unfinished business left behind in China.

This book not only displays the hardships and culture shock of coming to America but the mother, daughter, sister, and marriage relationships. The book really makes you feel empathetic for the daughter's struggle of being a first generation American, because of the different moral and overachieving standards from each culture. The only problem with the book is it doesn't have translations for some of the Chinese terms the characters use. I highly recommended this book, especially natives of San Franciscan's who can really picture and understand the agriculture monuments and setting from the book. Being Chinese American, I could really relate and picture the same traditions and standards from this book in my family. This book not only has topics Chinese Americans could relate to but other people who can relate to arranged marriages, interracial marriages, and absent parents. Don't be intimidated by the many pages and small print because once you start reading you won't be able to put the book down until you finish. If you cannot trust my word you can always watch the movie, which I hope aspire you to read the book and conclude with the same opinion, that you could recommend to your friends and family to get this book noticed.

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan is a novel that every mother and daughter should read together. It is all about the sacred mother daughter bond and discovering who we are and how much we have of our mother in us. This book perfectly describes the relationship and doesn't try to sugar coat it or add false drama. This is a real book. It was enjoyable to read because there was no point in the story where i felt as if I had to keep reading against my will. This was a thoroughly enjoyable book to read.

At first I was really sceptical about his book, I had to read it for an Ethnic Studies Class, but it turned out to be a great story of two cultures, Chinese and American. It playes with several hot topic issues in our american society today such as immigration and the problems fromm the immigrants point of view. This book really made me think about things in a new way, and I would recommend it to you. Its a mind-opening and captivating story.

The dynamism of mother-daughter relationships is certainly nothing new. There are hundreds, if not thousands of stories out there that describe this unique interaction from every conceivable angle, but Amy Tan gives it a fresh treatment with "The Joy Luck Club."

This is a clever and thoroughly genuine chronicle of the lives of four Chinese women and their daughters - told from both perspectives in small, vividly detailed vignettes that are almost complete stories within themselves. Tan gives each of these women character and life, and isn't afraid to expose the troubled elements that exist between them. The characters at times appear a bit one-dimensional in that much of what is described is the self-angst that each of them harbors due to the difficult times they have experienced, both in China and America, and contrary to the title of the book (or perhaps perfectly on purpose) there seems to be neither joy OR luck in these women's lives.

Many of the troublesome elements of their relationships are cultural in nature - with the reserved, proud and subservient attitudes of the mothers clashing with the individualistic and more self-centered traits of their daughters, who have been raised in America. The younger generation is understandably torn between obligation to the Chinese culture of their family while at the same time wanting to adapt to the American way of life, which in many ways is the polar opposite than that of the Chinese. While many aspects of Chinese culture - especially the way women are treated - are foreign and sometimes even repugnant to non-Chinese, Tan demonstrates in often subtle ways through her character interactions how sometimes the Chinese way of viewing life and conducting oneself is actually more beneficial in the long run.

My only other criticisms of this novel are that because of the way it is written, it is a bit hard to follow at times, and it would have also been nice to see Tan give a more thorough treatment to the roles that the men played in these women's lives. Generally speaking, the men are not seen in very much positive light, and it does end up seeming a bit unrealistic that the negative aspects portrayed were the only dimensions that existed in the brothers, fathers and sons depicted in the novel.

Overall, however, this is a very satisfying read and well worth the time.

This story is about four close mother's with four different daughters. The mother's tell about their struggles they had when they were younger and the daughters tell about their struggles now. The mother's stories always have a meaning for being told and it usually is brought about by their daughter's actions. It basically compares the mother's lives that they have lived, the Chinese way, to their daughters who were brought up the American way. The stories that are told are very heartfelt and tender. You feel like you are there in China dealing with the war and bombing; and then in San Francisco trying to deal with a job and a husband. For me, since I am a girl, it was very easy to relate to the hardships that the younger women felt towards their mothers. It made me sort of realize that a lot of girls don't get along with their mothers; yet it also taught me to deal with things in a different way - for the better. This book was exceptional and inspirational and it will be the one book that I read again and again. I personally don't enjoy to read but this book I absolutely loved!

I really liked The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan. Her short stories seemed so real, instead of fiction. Ms. Tan had such insight into the characters & what they had to deal with.She was also so creative in these stories. Ms. Tan definitely demonstrated the feelings of women at different ages and showed how your perception of life changes from age & lifestyle. The Joy Luck Club also displayed the strength that women possess to get through really difficult times. I gave this book a 4 because it was fantastic & I read it quickly but not a 5 because it was not perfect.

A nice story. That is all I can say. Maybe at the time it was written it could have been exceptional? Who knows. With the world so "close" together now the story is not that new but just nice.

Maybe I would have thought differently if I had read this at the time it was published?

The Joy Luck Club is a creative and unique novel that entwines the lives of four Chinese mothers and their daughters. Although, it is an engaging book, it is often times easy to become confused as you lose which daughter goes with what mother. Other than that though, it is interesting and true to life. It tells the story of the struggles mothers and daughters often have. The mothers and daughters experience hate, happiness, and despair. Many of these stories also deal with Chinese customs.
I completely enjoyed the book.

At first, I saw the movie a year ago. Then, i had to read the book for my english poject. I really enjoyed the book because I did not have trouble getting to learn and keeping up with all eight characters. I understood their relationships in this book. How? I think it is because I can relate to the book. My mother is the same way with her children. She pushes and pushes us to go to school and be a "doctor." The mothers of this story strongly encourage their daughters to be their best. They mainly do this because they pay most of their attention to what the other women think. There is also a competition within each and everyone of the main characters. They strive at being the better chinese mother. By doing this, they put their daughters in a lot of stress. Each set of mother and daughter have their own separate story to tell. All of the mothers in this story are part of a group called "Joy Luck Club." I titled this review, not just a "girly" book, because many people have the impression that this is a book preferably read by females. It is not true because I am coninced thea more guys should read this book and hopefully learn something from this. I definitely learned alot by reading this novel.

Amy Tan has wriiten a truly touching story here. Between four mothers and their daughters there is a lot to tell. The mothers all came from China for on reason or another. Then all had lives which were different and for some reason they all went to the US of A. A big part of the story is the enlightenment that june goes through with the help of her mothers three close friends and her experience after the death of her mother. She learns what it means to be chinese and how one is chinese. She learns secrets her mother had kept her whole life. She learns about herself and most of all, who she is and how she became that way. Amy Tan has really been able to write the stories of 4 women and lead them all together in the end and the stories of 4 daughters and do the same at the end. The beginning was a bit confusing as to who was who and who was speaking when, but as you got to know the characters it because more like knowing one friend from another. It all became tied together with grand strings that Amy Tan has been able to weave wonderfully.

This is an amazing book. It is about four Chinese mothers, and their daughters that were born in America. It tells two stories of each mother while she was in China and two stories about the daughters living in America. It is very interesting how what
happened to the mothers in China effected how they treated their daughters in America. The way that the different gengerations felt about their Chinese heritage was very interesing to me. The Girls that were born in America seem to be almost embarassed of their familys, and the mothers from China embrace the fact that they are Chinese. All the character are very different and they all seem to complement each other .I think thatI would recommend this book to girls more then boys because some of the issues that are talked about are specific to girls. I think that I would also recommend this book for people 11 and up because some of the vocabulary is a little difficult to understand. All and all I thought that this book was very good and I would recommends it to most everybody.

I came close to giving this book two stars because I found it so hard to follow. I don't necessarily blame the author. But I have found at the age of 70 that I do better with books I can relax with and not have to worry about keeping track of a host of characters. Also, when I try to remember what I have read only one thing really stands out in my mind which tells me that the book failed to touch me deeply. The one mind-blowing incident is the story of a woman who had to abandon her two babies. I was familiar with the Chinese concubines and so didn't really want to read more about this topic. I find polygamy to be a sad and frustrating topic, and so reading about the complications which can evolve from being one of five wives just made me tired. There are some excellent descriptive passages meant to help us to picture China. Very rarely, however, am I able to enjoy a great deal of description. The one exception so far has been the description in the book The Goldfinch--perhaps because I'd been to the places described. I'd heard that the relationships between mothers and daughters in this book might resonate with those who have had thorny mother-daughter relationships. But I didn't find this to be true for me. A book with the title Happy Birthday or Whatever about a Korean-American daughter and her Korean mother was far more illuminating for me because there were more specific incidents and more dialogue between mother and daughter.

I understand why this book received so much acclaim. The author is an excellent writer. I compare it with some classics (in fact it could be considered a classic) because perhaps one could learn a fair amount if one wanted to take enough time to study this book and maybe read it more than once. But it didn't make my heart sing. So I was fortunate that I could make it through the book once. Perhaps it is just a matter of taste.

I read this book about 10 years ago with my previous book club. I had a hard time following it. This time around, I enjoyed it. It is hard to follow, but if you split the names up. And think what they did, it may help.

The story is about mother's and daughter's relationships. Mostly, the asian mother's being able to relate to their daughter's which they did not seem to do well. The mother's did not understand them and the daughter's did not understand their mother. I would recommend this for anyone who has a book club.

What man among us has not at one point or another said that they did not understand a woman? What home grown American can honestly say they know what it is like to be an immigrant? How many of us know what real tragedy is? In fact, most of us live in comfortable circumstances. We live in warm homes, in well fed families. Sure, we all have inter-family tension, but few of us can imagine what is like to be a woman who has come from another, very foreign, country. We would have a hard time imagining what hopes she would try to bring to her offspring, and how she would live her own life. In fact, even if we did meet someone with these experiences, or read their memoirs, we would have a hard time relating to their often one-dimensional story. Here, Amy Tan, author of The Joy Luck Club, succeeded by not only putting us in the position of a single person with these amazing experiences, we have a multitude of points of views from many different women.
These women who immigrated from China, Suyan Woo, An-mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, and Yin-ying St. Clair, all have unique stories to tell. Not only this, but we also get to hear from their daughters. This presents an excellent means of having us relate to the Chinese ways of thinking. As the daughters think as Americans, but are brought up in a Chinese environment and therefore can relate the situations to us and have them make sense.
Situations that would otherwise seem so foreign to us are made clear with commentary from the daughters. One of the clearest examples is with Rose Hsu Jordan. Her mother, An-mei Hsu, tried to bring her up in the American way, strong and free willed. While An-mei is thinking of her daughter, "I was raised in the Chinese way: I was taught to desire nothing, swallow other people's misery, to east my own bitterness." Jordan is thinking, "There were too many choices." In the end, she married and lost herself to her husband Ted who is a Caucasian. Being what Ted's American set of values were, he then rejected her after years of marriage. This shows us the intricate relationship between a mother and her daughter, the cultural differences between the American norm and the Chinese norm, and the conflict that can arise from there. This is a situation most men would never understand to begin with, and Tan eloquently describes, almost as an extension of her own experiences.
Another situation where we are given a woman's insight into her relationship with her mother is with Jing-Mei Woo and her mother. Jing-Mei's mother was of the opinion that you could be anything you wanted to be if you tried hard enough. When Jing-mei was very young, she learned to resent all the pressure placed on her by her mother. She got to the point where she became sp paranoid of success by trying, that she learned to fail in everything in life from college to love. She felt everything her mother did was to make her miserable because she could not meet her mother's expectations, not to mention Suyuan Woo's expectations being raised because of the success of one of the other daughters of a Joy Luck club member named Waverley who was a chess prodigy. In reality, all her mother wanted was the best for her daughter. Suyuan just did not know the right way to communicate this when she was young and forever scared her daughter. To be able to look into Jing-mei's troubled life from both her view and her mother' we can piece together a complete picture of what was going through each one of their lives to bring them to that point.
In conclusion, this story portrays so many points of view on how life can be for a woman immigrating into the United States. You are forced to start relating to them in ways that Tan's writing easily makes possible. To truly understand all the possibilities, you must read the book, and this book is indeed worth reading.

Be Better Than Me
Joy Luck Club
Faith Blythe
The Joy Luck Club is a book composed of four different women who grew up in China. It is a story about the relationship between mothers and daughters. In China, the four women went through a lot of painful events. All of their daughters grew up in America. America is thought to be the land of freedom and the land of unlimited amounts of opportunity. Even though this book is about the relationship between mother's born in China and daughters born in American. Their relationships still resemble the relationships between American mothers and daughters. Both ethnic groups want the same thing for their children, which is something better than they had. Mothers try to tell their daughter know when something is wrong, give them advise, teach them what they are worth, respect, and that sometimes life is going to be challenging.
Most mothers see things that their children just cannot see. "All around this house I see the signs. My daughter looks but does not see. This is a house that will break into pieces. How do I know? I have always known a thing before it happens."(Amy Tan 275) Mother's often see things that their daughters don't. They try to tell them but they do not listen, until it is too late. In today's society daughters still don't listen, until it is too late. Lindo told her daughter Rose that her husband was sleeping with someone else. She did not believe her. Later in the book she found out that he was having affair. If she had of listened to her mother maybe she could have prevent the situation but at least she could have prepared herself emotionally for it.
"I was six when my mother taught me the art of invisible strength. It was a strategy of winning arguments, respect from others, and eventually, though neither us knew it at the time, the chess game."(Amy Tan 89) Her mother taught her not the cry and the strongest wind cannot be seen. She showed her how not to show people when she was hurt. Many times, in many cultures, mothers teach their daughters not to show their pain. The reason my mother taught me this is because people will too often attempt to play on your feelings. If they know how to hurt you, they will continue to hurt you, whenever they feel like it. She did not want me to be vulnerable.
My mother's expectations are so high of me. Sometimes I don't think I can live up to them. I don't want to let my mother down. I now know, as long as I try my best my mother will be proud of me. What happens if I fail!? June's mother believes her daughter could be anything she wanted to be in America. She could open a restaurant. June could buy a house with almost no money down or become rich. Suyuan, June's mother wanted her to become a prodigy. Suyuan wanted June to become a famous pianist. June never tried to play the piano. June wanted her mother to love her for her, unconditionally. Even though her mother paid for piano lessons. She never got better because she did not practice. `You want me to be someone that I'm not. I'll never be the kind of daughter you want me to be.'(Amy Tan 153) Suyuan finally explained that all she wanted her to do was try. So that she could have a better life than her. "But you never tried. That is what disappointed me." Suyuan gave up on her daughter becoming a child prodigy.
Lindo wanted Waverly to know her worth and polish it. An-mei was "taught to desire nothing, to swallow other people's misery, to eat my own bitterness. And even though I taught my daughter the opposite, still she came out the same way!"(Amy Tan 241) An-mei asked her daughter why she would not speak up for her- self. Rose and her husband were going through a divorce. Rose did not know what to do. Ted, her husband was estranged. He told her over the phone that he wanted a divorce. Afterwards, Rose did not call him, all she did was to sit and think. Her mother An-mei asked: "Why don't you talk to your husband?" After that conversation Rose stood up for herself. She told Ted that she was not moving out of their house. Mothers show their daughters how to respect themselves, let them know how much they are worth and not just except anything less than the best. If you settle for anything less than the best, then you compromise the quality of life expected for you by those who want the best for you. My mother still tells me: "Life is a sum total of our choices and that what we receive is in direct proportion to what we expect."
Mothers pass a lot of themselves down to their children, especially their daughters. They pass down behaviors, spirit, pain, love, and strength. An-mei's mother ate sticky sweet dumplings filled with a kind of bitter poison. "When the poison broke into her body, she whispered to me that she would rather kill her own weak spirit so she could give me a stronger one."(Amy Tan 271) Mothers can't tell their children how to act, but they can teach them how. An-mei's mother did not know how to teach her. So, she taught her the best way she knew how. By killing herself, she did teach her daughter how to have a strong spirit. Sometimes mothers use very hard tactics to get points across to their children. But they get their point across.
The book was excellent reading. The only thing I didn't like was the way the book kept switching between characters. The way the four women raised their daughters, is the same way mothers of today's society, raise their children.. Mothers want their daughters to be better than them.

When Rose Hsu Jordan attempts to define the Chinese words hulihudu and heimongmong she says, "they can't be easily translated because they refer to a sensation that only Chinese people have." And this sums up Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club - it is an introspective search into what it means to be a Chinese American. Tan adeptly translates these unique Chinese "sensations" to the reader through cleverly created characters of gimlet-eyed mothers and their incorrigible daughters. An indirect dialogue between mothers and daughters is set up through Tan's flawless storytelling. It is edifying without being didactic. Readers from all walks of life will walk away feeling wiser.

The book portrays the mental, physical and emotional journey of eight women of two different generations, and though their experiences were dfferent, they shared similar pains and sorrows. Their hidden emotions were only expressed through some form of dramatic or traumatic episodes in their lives. Amy Tan did a great job in comparing the two different generations and the similar pains and sorrows each one had to endure.

The Joy Luck Club is the story of four Chinese women who have moved to California to escape times of war in China. Over the years they have come to know each other through the Chinese Baptist Church, and meet once a month as the Joy Luck Club. The Joy Luck Club gives the women and their families the chance to mingle and celebrate their Chinese culture with traditional dishes and customs. Now that Suyuan Woo has passed away, it is her daughter, Jing-mei's turn to participate in the club and to learn about her heritage and her past.
Amy Tan's novel tells the tale of these strong women and their four daughters sharing the hardships of a different culture, failing relationships, and family conflicts.
Each chapter is told from the point of view of a different woman with different stories about growing up in San Francisco's Chinatown. Every story contains ties to ancient Chinese rituals and family traditions, including the Chinese game of mah jong, the red candle that must stay lit at both ends to grant marriage to a couple, and the place where the Moon Lady can make all wishes come true.
Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club is an excellent novel that tells the story of Jing-mei discovering herself and the importance of love and family bonds. Every character seems real and each situation is important to the life of the Chinese. I recommend this book to anyone interested in the life of other cultures, loving families, and realistic conflicts.

I have read The Joy Luck Club several times, and I am now doing my senior report on it. I find constant connections to Amy Tan's life. Besides being an inside look at Chinese-American culture, it is an entertaining story. The characters are real and developed, and the conflicts are both believable and interesting. I recommend this book to anyone whose literary diet does not consist solely of sci-fi and thrillers.

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, is a mesmerizing novel that leads the reader on a journey to remember. The novel interweaves the stories of four mothers and their daughters. Each chapter brings a new life to learn about, touching the heart in a different way every time. The author wants to leave the reader with a new outlook on the hardship one had to take to come to America. The relationship between mothers and daughters is also a strong theme in the novel. Although the changing of narrators may become a bit confusing, the novel still captures the reader with its entertaining characters and stories that lift the soul.

The novel is set in America in the present, but many of the stories are told about years past. Several of the stories talk about a time during the war between China and Japan and the people that fled their homes and country. Once in America they began new and better lives with their families. The daughters that grew up in America do not appreciate what their parents, especially their mothers, did for them. This generation gap between them causes frustration and anger for both the mothers and daughters throughout the novel.
The story begins with the character Jing-Mei Woo, whose mother recently passed away. She now has been asked to take her mother's place in the Joy Luck Club, a group of four women who bonded after leaving China, each for their own reason. Jing-Mei Woo describes the group, "They are young girls again, dreaming of good times in the past and good times yet to come" (41). Each new story is told by either a mother or a daughter about something important that has either already happened or is happening in their life. One of the mothers, Lindo Jong, tells the story of how she escaped her planned marriage and fled China to come to America. She explains how she felt after becoming free, "How nice it is to be that girl again, to take off my scarf, to see what is underneath"(66). One of the daughters, Lena St. Clair, tells the story of how her brother drowned when she was young. The stories continue, each more excellent than the last, until the end. The last story is told, once again, by Jing-Mei Woo about how she granted a special wish to her deceased mother.
The Joy Luck Club was a pure joy to read because of its entertaining characters, heart touching stories, and the special theme of mother-daughter relationships. Each chapter introduced a new life to learn about, which kept the novel enjoyable to read at all times. This changing of narrators did become a bit confusing; having to look back and remember which character is which. Other than that, each new person brought their own personality and story to tell, making the reader feel as if he/she were meeting a whole new group of friends. By the end of the book, the reader knows each character intimately. The book achieves its goal of having the reader learn about the heroic ordeal of immigration, through the detailed stories the women tell about leaving China to make better lives for their families. Several of the stories open the reader's mind to the heartache and turmoil the women had to go through to come to America. The work the mothers did so their daughters would have lives is not appreciated however. A large generation gap between the mothers from China and their American daughters is very evident in the novel. Since the reader hears from both the mothers and their daughters, he/she can see both of their views and opinions. The gap between generations is very easy to relate to, since many parents and their offspring see the world very differently, even today. The Chinese customs that are introduced in the book help give it culture. The game of mah jong is talked about, along with many other Chinese eating habits and celebrations. These simple touches give the reader a sense of China's interesting way of life and highlights how the daughters may see the world a little differently than their mothers.
The intertwined tales of four mothers and their daughters brings the reader on a journey from years ago in China to America in the present. Through all of the characters' individual stories about life, relationships, and Chinese culture, a single beautiful novel emerges that opens the mind and captures the heart.

Amy Tan's THE JOY LUCK CLUB is an intriguing tale of four Chinese mothers and their American born daughters as they attempt to understand one another despite their background and upbringing.

It is a tale that seems to have been created as a quilt would. All the stories of the mothers have been placed against those of their daughters to form a delicious contrast of relationship and understanding.

Each character has been highly developed and given a sense of familiarity and colloquial distinction. Tan seems to have taken marvelous care in forming the lives of Suyuan Woo, An-mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, and Ying-ying St. Clair. From these characters, Tan gives birth to their Americanized daughters: Jing-mei "June" Woo, Rose Hsu Jordan, Waverly Jong, and Lena St. Clair. Within the lives of these characters and the stories they tell, there exists a struggle to realize who the mothers are and consequently, who the daughters are and accept what it really means to be Chinese.

THE JOY LUCK CLUB is a book one can easily read over and over again and still be fascinated by the rich and colorful tale of how culture stitches relationships together.

I just finished reading The Joy Luck Club and I would highly recommend this book to all mothers and daughters. I am a first generation immigrant from India and there are many similarities in Indian and Chinese cultures. This book travels between America and China and explores intimately mothers and daughters of these two lands. It makes you smile, laugh and also cry. Amy Tan's intimate language flows easily and keeps you interested throughout. I have a daughter and this book intimately touched me in many ways as it explores the first generation immigrant mothers and their daughters. When I finished this book, I was ready to visit my local library and pick up her book "The Bonsetter's Daughter". Thank you Amy Tan for many hours of pleasure reading your book.

Joy Luck Club Review

The Joy Luck club orients itself around four Chinese immigrants and their daughters. The mothers fear they have not passed their life-stories and knowledge onto their daughters, while the daughters choose to ignore their mothers and their Chinese heritage. In the end the daughters undergo a transformation and accept their mothers and begin to accept their heritage and the way they were raised. This theme of cultural misunderstanding is exacerbated by adding the normal mother/daughter misunderstandings to its confusion. All of the daughters, at some point in the book, tell of an instant where their mother's Chinese was impossible to translate into English, because of cultural differences that made it impossible for the daughters to fully understand what their mothers were trying to tell them.

At first it was confusing which daughter belonged to which mother, but that really doesn't matter, because many of their experiences were based on their similar upbringing and their relations with their mothers. It is interesting how many of the daughters were unfriendly with one another when they shared so much in common. They just couldn't rise above the pettiness in their lives to see this. I was happy when the plot lines tied together and the daughters learned to accept their mothers and learned to be grateful to be their mother's daughter. To me, this love and acceptance was truly the moral of the story. The plot concluded itself by Jing-mei realizing what her mother had given her: her life, her love, and two sisters. What more could she have asked for?

Even though they are not the main voices of the stories, the mothers are the heroines. Amy Tam does a wonderful job of telling their stories in precise and poetic language that takes the readers on a voyeuristic journey through the lives of these 4 families and their ancestors.

The first time I read this novel more than 20 years ago, the power of Ms Tan's story telling just bowled me over; I did not even notice that it was a 'mother daughter' category novel. The stories of the mothers were particularly magical and tragic. And the ones of Number 4 wife was developed as (I think) a 'Queen Gambit' when she sacrifices her life for her children; and it works.

Now I am rereading it and it still has power. Now I can perceive the similarity in character of the mothers and their interactions with their daughters. One has to wonder whether Ms Tan is describing her own mother and their own arguments. I also note that the quixotic twists in the plots of the various stories remind me of the planning and developing of chess game strategies. Many of the stories end in a 'draw', the game continues as does life; others like the one about the architect ends with a dramatic shift in power and the game continues. The last one about 'June' (I can remember that name) meeting her 2 sisters is a sort of 'winning' conclusion even though her mother (the queen) is no more.

This is a wonderful book and can be be enjoyed by anyone who enjoys well crafted stories with a difference.

"Intensely poetic, startlingly imaginative and moving, this remarkable book will speak to many women, mothers and grown daughters."
This book is about four, Chinese women, who migrated from China and to America, during the confused time of war, between Japan and their country. Each women experiences very hard and sad time in her girlhood, but they migrate to America with big hope of a new life. However, they were forced to live unstably as immigrants in America. They also struggle for confrontation with their daughters who were born in America. But they can overcome these difficulties with their positive attitude not to leave their hopes. We can see the ideas and sense of values of Chinese women in this book. This book gives readers courage and hope.
The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan is truly a remarkable book. It is a novel that deals with the relationships between mothers and daughters and also the conflicts between Chinese and American cultures. A delight to read, this novel involves the reader as it progresses through the stories of these four mothers and four daughters. These characters deal with issues such as rape, divorce, failure, abandonment, and many more. Throughout this novel, by dealing with these issues, the daughters learn to understand their mothers' views on life.
The Joy Luck Club is a collection of short stories, arranged into chapters with an individual theme - love. The stories are all diverse, which keeps the book interesting, yet they still intertwine and relate to each other. Along with the chapters being in different themes, the book is grouped into four segments containing four chapters, one chapter per segment from each of either the mothers or daughters. The mothers and daughters have extremely different outlooks on life, which are shown though the chapters from their own perspective. These outlooks and different perspectives add to the depth of the cultural conflict between the American daughters and Chinese mothers.
I could not put this novel down once I opened it! As a result of reading this novel I have learned to really treasure the mother-daughter relationship. This novel holds a truly remarkable story that helps one to appreciate human diversity and understanding. It is honestly one of the best books I have ever encountered. The Joy Luck Club is priceless.

Written from the point of view of a true Chinese born American, Amy Tan reveals the reality about immigrating to a new country and living amongst diverse cultures in the book The Joy Luck Club. Four separate stories twist around each other about four girls and their mothers who came from China's hardships a couple of years back. The four mothers met through weekly games of mahjong, gossiping and sharing their unique stories with each other. As each realized how many times they could have lost hope, they named their weekly visits "The Joy Luck Club". Tan unravels each family secret deliberately, making each one different, but just as sophisticated. She portrays the difficulty each girl goes through as they struggle from the grasps of their culture and tradition to become an American.
Born as a Chinese-American myself, there are times when I feel like I can never fit in perfectly anywhere. With English constantly at the tip of my tongue, I'm taken as a foreigner in Asian countries. However, in any Western country, my black hair and dark eyes Asian features immediately reveals my identity. Through Tan's book, I have a new perception that living a diverse life means keeping an open heart to fit into foreign cultures, but to never abandon our own traditions. I can celebrate Christmas, the Fourth of July, speak English, and listen to American pop singers, but I must not ever forget how to speak, read, or write my Chinese dialect, the Lunar calendar and it's wonderful holidays.
Tan wrote beautifully, being incredibly sensitive with her descriptions of the contrast between two very different cultures. Those who are open-minded to our diverse world would thrive inside these stories. Those with mixed backgrounds would be filled with complete understanding. Those who are Chinese born American must pick up this book sometime along their own path.

This was the first novel that I have ever read by Amy Tan and it was outstanding. She did a masterful job of explaining how this group of four women came together and became known as the Joy Luck Club. Each of the four women has a daughter and there is a section of the book for each of the eight women in which you hear in great detail about past experiences and how they relate to the events that were then unfolding in each of their lives. For me, it was this type of character development that really brought this novel to life. The author also gave the reading audience the opportunity to take a peek into a new and different culture. I especially liked the way the mother's would prefer to talk in their native Chinese dialect and the daughters spoke in very fluent English. This was, no doubt, a byproduct of their having been raised primarily in America.
The way that the four mothers used the Mahjong table as not only a means of playing a game but also as a way to reflect on their past and share their hopes and dreams for their own daughters was wonderful. It allowed them to forget, even if only for a few hours, about the tragedies and heartache that they had all been through and allowed them to bond with one another. Each of the women represented a wind direction at the Mahjong table and when the time would come that they would pass away, as Suyuan Woo did early on in the novel, the respective daughters of those women would then assume their role at the table. To me, there was never a dull moment in this book and I know that I will be reading it again and again. I definitely recommend this book to anyone, especially those who are reading an Amy Tan novel for the very first time.

I was required to read this for my Honors English class freshman year. It was definitely interesting, but I found it hard to relate to on some levels because it is for such a female-oriented audience, and I wasn't able to identify with the foreign alienation that comes with being a Chinese immigrant.
The story is brisk at some times, yet scathingly slow in a couple parts. Nevertheless, the characters are all interesting and provide something different for every reader, and for every time you read it.

Amy Tan weaves the story of four mother's and their four daughters in the unforgettable tale of 'The Joy Luck Club'. It's an exploration of the mother-daughter relationship, about the things they have in common and don't even realize, and of the things they want each other to know about themselves but don't always know how to say. The story that begins with 8 people gathering to play mah jong and make profitable investments leads to life-long friendship. Through the humor and the tears, I loved every page.

The Joy Luck Club By Amy Tan
The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan is no doubt, one of the most enchanting American-Chinese books I have ever read. It was written based on some of the old Chinese history and traditions, traveling through a time line from the early 1900s to the 1990s. It tells the story of four mothers and their daughters. Each story describes the lives of the mothers and how their histories made impacts on their daughters. Every one of them is different, some are heart wrenching, bringing me to the verge of tears, some of them are more optimistic, and definitely inspirational. Amy Tan clearly portrayed differences in the mothers and their daughters in their opinions and perceptions of the things, drawing a well-defined line between the old traditional Chinese beliefs and the modern first generation American concepts. Yet, amidst these differences, little similarities were slowly revealed. She made use of certain events to draw the parallels in the mother-daughter relationships, and little symbolic metaphors that sum up each story. Little things that hide behind the big events slowly uncover themselves each time I read this book. Although this is an American Chinese book, it would definitely still be interesting for other races to find out more about the Chinese culture and to understand its traditions better. This is indeed Asian-American literature at its best and I would not hesitate to recommend this book to anyone.
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Overall I think this was a good book. This book is a collection of short stories arranged into chapters with individual themes. The stories are all different but they all relate to each other, which keeps the book interesting. The book is divided into four parts; each part has four chapters, one chapter per part from either the mothers or daughters. They all have various perspectives on life, which they express in their chapter. It had great ideas and showed Chinese and American culture very well. However, the wording could have been better by making it less complex. All four mothers' stories blended together because of their daughters' age and common background, this was shown in a simple way. This made it easier to understand their relationships and stories. The contrast between Chinese suffering and strength and American ease and unhappiness was vividly illustrated in this book. Almost anyone can relate to this book but not everyone can understand it, so I recommend that you should read this book but you should wait until you can understand it. You will get a lot more out of this book that way.

The Joy Luck Club is a story of mothers and daughters, of two generations coming together and trying to understand one another. Through the mothers' stories and the daughters' similar experiences that help them to learn from their mothers, they learn to love one another for who the other truly is and was. Though the daughters in The Joy Luck Club have hard times understanding their mothers, and appreciation for the mother's traditional Chinese ways comes difficultly, the girls learn through the stories that their mothers were once young like them, having dreams and aspirations for their future. It's a beautiful book of broken relationships healed, of old bitterness surfaced and dealt with, and ultimately of finding yourself in the people you love most.

the Chinese aspect of the book is intriguing. There are so many customs and traditions that I have taken for granted, having many Chinese friends and yet never fully understanding who they are and what their culture is. This book opens up a whole new philosophy to life that is foreign and seemingly irregular to the average American-Western reader. But after reading this book I have found the honest, devoted, and terrifyingly loving reasons behind Chinese ways, which is challenging to my own comfortable beliefs and the social structure that I have grown up in.

Amy Tan's novel is a literary classic about the challenges of culture and the weaving of the bond between mothers and daughters. Tan writes the novel displaying the power and struggles with women, with male characters playing a very small role. It was an interesting read due to the fact that many of the daughters were struggling to become more American, and less of their original heritage. The only tough part about this book for me was how heavily it was aimed towards females and their bonds with one another, but the parables between each story added to the intrigue built throughout the book. Overall, I enjoyed each story even though I am a male and I strongly feel that this book will be important throughout the ages as it deals with the maturity as well as remembering your heritage.

The Joy Luck Club, I cannot help but admit, is a good book. It is a book that is precisely what daughters and mothers should read as I believe it reveals a lot of the infrastructure of these relationships, and has the capability to make such people aware of their own relationships. Not that I'm saying this book is a tell-all self-help book, revealing the Top Ten Secrets to Successfully Getting Along With Your Daughter, or the Top Five Real Ways that Daughters Piss off Their Mothers. It is, of course, fiction. It is a book of interlacing short stories about Chinese mothers and their American/Chinese daughters. It is a story of the clash between mothers and their daughters, both literally and metaphorically through the addition of the cultural differences that seem to separate them. Each daughter has her own trial that she must overcome, and, in some way, it is reflective (or refractive) of her own mother's trials that she struggled with while still in China. Amy Tan beautifully demonstrates that the relationship of the mother and daughter is so closely related that it moves beyond blood and into circumstance, and that not even culture or language can separate them.

The only problem with this book comes from the fact that I am a guy. I have no doubt that I am a guy, and therefore am quite secure in saying that this book is not for guys. A guy may read it, may be entertained by it, but it won't hold the same impact, the same punch that it delivers to the women who read this book. Only vicariously can I feel the emotion that Tan is putting into this book, and that only through seeing someone else, female, reading the book and talking about how close to home it hit them and how close to tears they got. Otherwise, all I see is a bunch of women having their problems, arguing about them, and coming to some sort of conclusion by the end. Though, I say this while at the same time complementing Tan's prose, and being amazed at her ability to put words and cultures together to create such a beautiful volume of stories. I don't know, maybe it's just the fact that almost every guy in this story seems to be described as being ignorant, dumb, or, in some form, a dirty rotten jerk. I've heard bad things about my sex (being gender, just so you know), but I'm not convinced that we're all bad (or that these women aren't, in some way, just as bad... but I will duck away before I make anyone mad and cease my meandering comments).

The Joyluck Club is a sad and an entertaining book. It's a book about four mothers who taught their daughter what their Chinese culture's like. The mothers move from one place to another and learn their new life there. They try to teach their daughters, their chinese life even though they know english pretty well and were born in United States. They still have a part of chinese in them.
I would recommend this book to anyone! this book is a great book.

This book and The Kitchen God's Wife, also by Ms. Tan, are very similar in terms of theme and mood. There were multiple generations of women, each of whom didn't entirely understand the struggles the other went through. This was an interesting study of how we can interact with and communicate with another person, without ever understanding them completely.

This is a story of love between four immigrations families. There are four Chinese women and their four American daughters have been written on this book. The book has talked about the different behavior and thinking way between the four Chinese mothers and their American daughters. Each individual story in this book is enough with different language and different culture. This book is good at separating the whole book with each individual little story that is very helpful for me to be concentrating. When I was reading the book, I was interesting at reading very small stories. From reading the whole book, I spent a lot of time on fingering out who is the mother and this girl is whose daughter. And also I spent a lot of time on reading the mothers' experiences from their previous time and American time. From this book, I see how each Chinese woman come to America with difficulties and how they faced the difficulties and trading their new life.
This book talked a lot about women and their daughters, I heard many people said this is a woman book, but I think this book is good for everyone because it could tell us what are love and the relationship between parents and children. This book is a very good choice for everyone to read and learn the experiences of dealing with the relationship of parents and children from the four Chinese women and their American daughters. This is a book used four Chinese women as the example of how Chinese people raised their own country by personally during the war and also using their whole life to teach their daughters to do so.

The book is about Mothers and Daughters, mothers with history so rich and colorful in the heart of china and daughters whose life are so modern yet, intersecting the life of their mothers. It follows the mothers lives in China, their lives in San Francisco, whilst detailing the daughters lives in modern society and their perspectives of their mother. It was a very satisfying book.

I loved the book! It made me feel so at home with the thought of making mistakes and being the family screw up.It taught me about the old ways of the women back in the 1900's in ancient China. Between the 4 mothers and the 4 daughters there is a great difference in their behaviors and values. Throughout the whole novel Amy Tan brilliantly illustrated the times, the settings and how the events occurred.The mothers were strong willed, highly strict in the old ways of tradition, and held true to their beliefs. The daughters adapted well to the new and modern ways of the Americans, but sadly along the way lossed the meaning in what their families trully represented.The somewhat lossed daughters were eventually saved by their overbarring mothers with the traditions of their ancestors.

Each and everyday, our generation continues to expand its range of different ethnicities and backgrounds as more families immigrant to the U.S. What Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club proves to show is the universal yet distinctive everyday conflicts of ethnic parents raising American children.

In this novel, readers begin a journey with four Chinese mothers and daughters through series of storytelling-including all woman taking a flashback to their childhood or some previous memory.

Moreover, the novel extracts how the American lifestyle that is somewhat different to the lifestyle the mother's were accustomed to creates a gap between the mother and daughters. The Joy Luck Club itself is a club where one mother, Suyuan Woo, created with three other Chinese woman in order to save and collect money as a group and bring up the spirits through the hard times of WWII. After Suyuan dies, her daughter, Jing-mei, has to fill her spot in the club as she finds out more about her mother than ever before, for example, Jing-mei discover she has two half-sisters. This novel creates a character that is able to grow with the reader as she finds out more about her mother's life and ultimately her own life as well. The discoveries allow not only Jing-mei but the readers as well to leave the book with hope as a closer bond with her mother is formed. Jing-mei creates closure with her mother's death as the readers and Jing-mei herself learn the sacrifices and loyalties of all for mothers when raising their daughters.

Since the novel is divided into four major parts, in which the mothers speak out in the first section, readers never seized to boredom, for there is a new exciting adventure that begins as each mother and daughter tells their own story. Even though the structure contributes to grasping the readers attention, readers may find it hard to collect and remember all the stories together.

I was given this book by my 8th grade social studies teacher when I was 13 years old, on the eve of my 30th birthday this book is still a treasured favorite. The complexity of the relationships between the daughters and their mothers is compelling. The histories of the mothers are telling and heartbreaking. This book will take you to a different place and time, give you a look into lives where tradition and culture can crush you or set you free. As a person of few words it is hard to describe my long history with this book, I guess the most prudent thing to say is thank you Mrs. Potter.

Personally, I thought the book was going to be better than expected, seeing that it was a reading requirement for English. Amy Tan has a knack for writing, espically in this style. I enjoyed the fact that the reader had the ability to go into the minds of each of the characters and knowing the whole situtation. Also, the story-line was great because it was something that people could have emotion towards. I also liked the fact that it wasn't a fairy-tale type story, where everything was happy, and nothing ever goes wrong.
However, I believe many people over-critize this novel. This story is something that is not limited to Asains and thier struggles. In fact, this is a story that EVERY PERSON can relate to, not just Asians or minorities in general. This story is about mothers and thier relationship with their daughters as well as being a part of a certain culture. The main idea is mothers passing down their life experiences to their kin and hopefully, them using the advice to their advantage. Everyone has gone through a period of time when they believed that their parents didn't understand them and visa-versa.

The Joy Luck Club reflects back and forth between the lives of four Chinese women and their struggles with their past in China in1949. As they relate their lives to their daughters who are Americanized they tell about great struggles and inner strengths that made them who they are. The novel kicks off at a mah jong table where June takes her late mothers place in the Joy Luck Club with all her mothers' friends as they celebrate June going to China to meet her twin sisters and tell them about the death of their mother.
Through out the novel, the mothers tell their stories of horrible tragedies and inner triumphs as they each envy the lives of their daughters and teach them about their past. Tan does a great job in describing the depth of misery that brought these women to find strength that they would have never known they had if it hadn't been for the circumstances given. Tan makes me feel that I am right there feeling the characters pain and then rejoicing in their glory of freedom of spirit!
It is sometimes easy to become confused on which story connects with the other. Despite that, each story is interesting. The book deals with all types of real life struggles mothers and daughters face now and have faced in the past. Although many of the stories deal with Chinese customs, many of the other stories are universally experienced by all women at one time or another. The characters deal with issues such as rape, divorce, failure and abandonment. The mothers and daughters experience love and hate, happiness and despair. Amy Tan introduces all of the characters in the present, but then takes them back to their childhood through their memories. Each woman eventually becomes related to the other women as the stories become more complex. It explores old Chinese customs in detail, as well as the responsibility and honor the Chinese hold for their family. The way she ties in Chinese culture with the adaptation of American life gives the reader a chance to see how other cultures are. I like exploring into different unique culture because they are unique, interesting and mainly because I am tired of witnessing the American culture and that I thrive for something new.
I enjoy playing mah jong on the internet. It is widely played in Chinese culture. It is a game of skill and wits. The mothers and daughters played the game with actual pieces. Overall I like the book it tells about the Chinese being discriminated in the U.S.A. I think any feminist hesitate to reading this book. This book taught me sometimes how cruel this country can be.

I came to the United States at age of 18 from Taiwan and I had been here for seven years. During these years I seemed to "learn" things about Asia like how Asian females are supposed to be passive and males are likely to be gansters and treat females badly. I learned about the stereotypes from American public media, and Joy Luck Club is just another example of those, only maybe more popular than the similar sort. There is always a danger of Asian Americans writing books about Asian. Under that seemingly identical physical appearance is a whole different style of thinking, the American one. Having never lived in the modern( and I emphasize, MODERN) China or any Chinese speaking countries and obviously lacking a true understanding about Chinese culture is simply to humiliate Chinese. I hate to see this book selling like hotcakes knowing a great majority of readers probably would adore it. This book is NOT a guide to Chinese culture nor Chinese people. Please, no more saving the poor Chinese women from evil Chinese men's hand, and no more "now you are save in America" kind of attitude. There are thousands of Chinese international students like me, coming from good families, living a good life style, and have never had to go through an arranged marriage. I suggest the author take a long trip to China and do more research before writing anything about it.

I had to read this book in a first year english course at university. So like I thought I would hate it, because well the books you get assigned to read are usually pretty boring. This was a great surprise however. The story was beautifully told, and it gives the reader great insight into the Chinese Culture. This book was a great read and Amy Tan is a great author.

I am aware that many people and critics have given much critical acclaim for The Joy Luck Club, and how today it's considered a modern classic novel of the Asian-American experience. First of all, Amy Tan is an excellent writer. The only good things i can say about this book is how it examines the relationships between mother and daughter, American stereotypes of Asians, and i like how Amy Tan allows all of the mothers and daughters to have their own voice with each of their narratives. The only problem i have with this novel, however, is that all of the characters and their narratives are so one-dimensional, and she herself seems to stereotype her own characters and their men. Even though Amy Tan does make a few points about America's perception of Asian-Americans, and the stereotypes, she doesn't really break new ground with it. It's common knowledge that Asian get stereotyped, pretty much all minorities do. And she doesn't really break those stereotypes, to some degree she kind of enhances non-Asians to actually believe those stereotypes. And all in all, i just feel that the stories are not very consistent. Some seem to correlate with another story, and some just seem kind of random. And in my opinion, they are pretty forgettable. The only memorable story was Jing-Mei Woo: "The Joy Luck Club," where she learns more about her mother and discovers that she has 2 half-sisters in China. I kind of thought that the rest of the book would be more about that, and more about the Joy Luck Club in general. But after that it just felt as if i were reading short stories from highschool portfolios. I dunno, overall, an interesting read, but based on what i read i don't really understand why this book is considered a "classic" for no other reason in that it examines the relationships between mother and daughters very well. It doesn't necessarily make it a memorable book that i will read years later. And like i said before, just because the characters are Asian and they talk about the problems of stereotypes and cultural differences between the ones they came from and the one they moved in doesn't necessarily make it the BEST book that talks about the Asian-American experience. I just think there are better books out there that can make this same message without making it seem so predictable and one-dimensional.

THE best book on assimilation and one of the best books ever!

These daughters struggle to find a place in both a new American culture and a native Chinese one. Yet each woman is distinct and different from the other, and each daughter has a distinct and unique relationship with her mother.

It's a GREAT read--Much better than the movie!

The Joy Luck Club written by Amy Tan (also the author of The Hundred Secret Senses) is an entertaining novel of four Chinese mothers and four Chinese American daughters. All the mothers get together to play Mah-jongg and talk about their Chinese lives. While the daughters try and forget that they are Chinese. Only until each daughter experiences problems where only their mother can be the one to offer advice do they really appreciate their heritage.
The Joy Luck Club's short stories fit together well and each one has a meaning to think about. I found myself actually thinking of what each story meant and how it could relate to my life. However, I do not know how authentic the novel represents the Chinese culture because I do not know very much about their culture. I gave this book a 4 because it is well written and has moral value, however it did drag on in parts. If you would like to read a book about mothers and daughters that has value I would suggest The Joy Luck Club.

I initially read The Joy Luck Club for a literature class. I was picking randomly, and through some stroke of luck, came across this well written group of vignettes. The book used wonderful imagery to portray the sights, sounds, smells, and mood of each individual scene.

The stories switch setting and characters by chapter, and generations by section. I won't say this made for an easier read. I found it helpful to keep a sheet with a few major plot points from each chapter, to make the book easier to follow. This also helped bring some of the tiny nuances to the surface.

The stories, which know no order, are brilliantly written, and weave in and out of each other, sometimes crossing paths, and adding small details and subtext to each story. Most striking was the lack of influence and communication between mothers and daughters. While the daughters are quick to dismiss their mothers as semi-literate burdens, the mothers had important lessons that would help their daughters. I strongly recommend this book to anyone, no matter their heritage, age, or familial situation.

I think the book is very interesting to read and I liked the way Tan portrays her characters. Even though you may find some of them pretty self-centered and lacking any sense of responsibility, you get a very good image of every one of them, and might even feel with some. I also believe it helps to understand people from a different cultural background.

I thought the Joy Luck Club was a decent book. It was a bit confusing at times because you forget who's who sometimes but other than that it had some interesting parts in it. The mothers and daughters go through a lot of difficult times. Each mother and daughter have their own stories which make the book a little more interesting. If all the stories were lumped together, I don't know if I would call it a decent book. It has a lot of situations in which many people can relate to. It allows people of different cultures to appreciate how the daughters feel about their mothers and also the other way around. Overall this book was decent. It's not a book that I would personally recommend to people but having read it, I think it was an enjoyable book.As a matter of fact I think I will give it 4 stars instead of 3.

The Joy Luck Club was not the best book I have read. It wasnt bad, but it could have been better. I think Amy Tan intended any mother, or more likely a daughter to read this book because it shows the strong bonds between them. I did like the way the book ended because it wrapped up the separate lives and showed how they connected in mother-daughter relationships. The title of the book is a good one because it is the central idea of the stories. The club is what ties all the stories together and keeps the relationships of the women and their daughters together. The most interesting part of the book for me, was the story about June's mother and how she fell overboard off of a boat with her family. She got picked up by another boat and dropped off on land, and she was very scared. It was suspensful and exciting to see how she was goin to get home. If she had never found her family again, June may not have even been born. The kost interesting part of the book was when the women told the story of how June's mother got to the United States. She had to carry her two babies through the streets, and she eventually had to leave them in China because the war and all the hardships she had to go through were too much for her to handle. Tan's style of writing was a bit confusing, but interesting. She used a lot of flashbacks to storytell, and she wrote in a way that made the novel exciting and informative because I learned a lot about Chinese and American culture, and how to adjust to a new style of living.

Hi I am a Korean and I am ninth grader in San Domenico upper school. I read "The Joy Luck Club" because of class book club. When I first read this book I didn't like it because this book was complicated to read. Finally, I finished this book and I really liked it. I thought of my mother and family. I realized what every mother hope, such as hoping their children grow better than themselves is the same. The first chapter is about four mothers' past story and chapter two and three is about four daughters' past and present story. The last chapter is about four mother' present story. The four mothers and four daughters always have conflicts but they love and understand each other. I recommend this book to teenager and adults. If they read this book they can understand each other and realize family's important.

The Joy Luck Club is a book that anybody can relate to. Although most people don't have to deal with being the chess champion or a lower class wife, we can relate to the simple family problems that they all dealt with. The generation gap between the Chinese mothers and their "American" daughters was insightful especially with how they dealt with their problems. The daughters couldn't understand their parents just the same way that we can't understand ours. After reading this book, it made me realize the intricate workings of my family and how one little thing can have an adverse affect on the entire family. This book was great and I recommend it to anybody who would like to understand themselves or their families.

The Joy Luck Club is composed of four sections, containing sixteen interwoven stories, all of which detail the different journeys of Chinese-born mothers who immigrated to the states, and their American-born daughters. The stories were touching and dealt with the universal themes of finding identity, the challenges that come with integration, and sacrificing for love. I found myself able to relate on some level with the mother/daughter relationships in these stories. Though my own circumstances are quite different, the complexities between mothers and daughters---longing to please one's mother while trying to find one's own, separate identity, as well as the notions of sacrifice and the idea that one carries on her mother's legacy---are translatable on some level to my own life and relationship with my mother. In this sense, I was very pleased with the novel. It continues to keep my interest.

The Joy Luck Club was a very easy book to read and understand. The book tells the stories of four mothers and their daughters and the contrast between the way they were raised. The mothers were all raised in old fashioned Chinese tradition, while the daughters were raised here in America. There was a constant struggle for communication and understanding between the mothers and their daughters trying to get the other to understand them. The book was a little confusing because of the constant switching between the character's stories, watching the movie helps to discern which stories are which. Mooooo.....

In a mixed race society, misunderstanding amongst different ethnicities occurs frequently. In her novel The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan asks what happens when different generations of the same heritage misunderstand each other. Tan focuses on the stifling relationships between mothers and daughters from seemingly separate centuries. The driving wedge proves to be cultural. Tan questions the role of culture in individuality and whether one can choose to ignore her history. After reading this novel, one gains a new respect for history and ancestry. Using academic literary techniques such as symbolism and characterization, Tan presents a complimentary view on heavily culture-based societies.

Tan presents the generations as squaring off across polar universities. The mother generation came from a society of political and societal upheaval. The dictatorial Chinese power is turned upside down by Japanese insurgents. The mothers live solely for surviving with a modicum of dignity. They escape from a dangerous political regime-"America was where all my mother's hopes lay...after losing everything in China" (141), only to lose a definitive piece of their culture. The country is a melting pot of heritages, diluting each society to a dull broth. The daughters are of the selfish generation today. They view their Chinese history as a barrier, a road block to their dreams. All they see is the disappointment of their mothers. As Rose Hsu Jordan says, "After seeing my mother's disappointed face once again, something inside me began to die" (144). The daughters find solace from this disappointment in the secular culture. From the mothers' perspective, the daughters' behavior is cutting. Lindo Jong says, "I am ashamed. Because she is my daughter and I am proud of her, and I am her mother but she is not proud of me" (291). Both of these opinions push the generations to act. The mothers cling to their culture, the daughters shove it away. Tan portrays the mothers as embroiled to combat the secularized mellowness of American culture and the daughters as cult believers in American vanity. The purpose of the novel is to define how much culture can direct the actions of an individual.

Tan analyzes character and personality in culture. The determination given derives from both political and geographical roots. For the Chinese culture in the novel, "Once you are born Chinese, you cannot help but feel and think Chinese" (306). Tan distinguishes between a political and a geographical alliance to a society. The difference being one driven by fear or consequence versus one based on devotion and love. The mothers devote themselves to their Chinese background, but not to the country's rulers. These women connect because of a shared love for their culture. As Jing-Mei Woo describes of her mother, "My mother could sense that the women of these families also had unspeakable tragedies they had left behind in China and hopes they couldn't begin to express in their fragile English" (6), while tragedy brought them together culture united them. The mothers fear that this "joy-luck" culture will not pass on, "They are frightened. In me they see their own daughters, just as ignorant, just as unmindful of all the truths and hopes they have brought to America...They see daughters who will bear grandchildren born without any connecting hope passed from generation to generation" (31).The daughters in the novel do not want to feel a connection to their ancestry. Yet, as Tan points out, a person cannot escape heritage. Culture need not be a shackle, however. As Lindo Jong says, "I made a promise to myself: I would always remember my parents' wishes, but I would never forget myself" (53). A person's culture can act as a flavorful spice in personality. Tan argues that the fact of culture does not denote eternal and absolute submission to an idea.

As a multi-cultural novel, The Joy Luck Club accomplishes in developing understanding of generational and cultural disparity. Tan's powerful use of symbolism creates a metaphor for cultural imprisonment-"The water heated up and the pot began to clatter with this crab trying to tap his way out of his own hot soup...screaming as he thrust one bright red claw out over the side of the bubbling pot" (226). By using insightful, contextual symbols, Tan invites the reader into the constrictive barriers of this culture. Writing from a Chinese heritage, Tan takes advantage of the cultural reliance on animal importance to cultivate depth in its intellectual meaning. Her imagery representing individuality is concrete and memorable, "She and I have shared the same body. There is a part of her mind that is a part of mine. But when she was born, she sprang from me like a slippery fish, and has been swimming away ever since" (274). The use of these symbols and imagery is divided between divergent viewpoints. As the novel shifts in perspective, Tan develops distinguishable character voices. If not for these constant voice cues, one might get lost in the ever-changing plot developments. Not only does this make the novel an easier and interesting read, but by doing so Tan directs the reader to shift viewpoints from character to character. Each character contributes a new facet to this culture-based society. There is a distinctive generational separation on the view of cultural responsibilities. This musical-chair narration adds to the idea of generational and cultural diversity. Tan's wielding of literary tools carves out a masterpiece of twentieth century literature.

Ultimately, Tan wants the reader to see that a person can remain selective of her culture without rejecting the entire heritage. Writing on the same idea, David Henry Hwang's Golden Child conversely argues that there is no compromise between eastern and western ideals. Unlike Hwang, Tan incorporates character evolution to accomplish a balance of the conflicting societies. For instance, Tan allows a character to declare in one moment, "My mother and I spoke two different languages...I talked to her in English, she answered back in Chinese" (23) and then to say, "My mother was right. I am becoming Chinese" (306). Even the women of stringent cultural heritage undergo a change in the novel. The practical use of character progression forges new opportunities for Tan. Without it, her position would be inarguable. Humanity is ever changing and cultures transform-making it easier to balance cultural responsibility and individuality.

Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club is a study of maternal relationships and cultural influence. Her use of literary elements argues that culture is meant to be a joy, not a burden. Tan succeeded in educating this generation in its filial responsibilities.

About a third of the way into the book I had to wiki up Amy Tan because the language content of the book made me strongly wonder about her upbringing. The language seems to be purposefully exotic-sounding, such as "The fifteenth day of the eighth moon". I'm sorry, but Chinese people do not speak like that. It's "Eighth month, fifteenth day". Mandarin is sprinkled in non-dialoge text to make it sound foreign, calling mahjong tiles "pai"s when tiles (or even cards) are perfectly suited and typically used by English-speaking Chinese. Or another example, "... Waverly Place Jong, my official name for important American documents. But my family called me Meimei", as though she felt like her name belonged to America instead of herself. Truthfully, this is a common happenstance in nearly every Chinese household, and is not limited to Anglicized names. Nicknames are extremely commonplace today in Chinese speaking countries and households, and one would hardly say their given Chinese names are for official Chinese documents, as though their named belonged to China and not themselves. These "family" nicknames are not used by persons outside of the family, and so one's proper name would be used, for example, in school and by friends. Thus, one would not really feel separated feeling form one's own name.

Things like that makes the book feel extremely disingenuous to someone who is a first-generation western-born Chinese and already has first hand an understanding of Chinese culture via western perspective. It reminds me of reviews I read for a Jewish New Testament (English Translation), where the reviewers accused the editors/translators of unnecessarily dropping in Yiddish in order to make the text sound more Jewish to appeal to non-Jews. From what seems like extra exerted effort to "Chineseify" the text, I (incorrectly) suspected Amy Tan was someone who was raised very western/white washed (perhaps 2nd or more generation) and was over-compensating using language.

It's not that the stories themselves are bad or disingenuous, in fact they reflect the culture so much it angers me (because it reminds me of my own upbringing) when I read it, but the language delivering the stories is trying too hard and distracting. I gave 2 stars because the distracting language makes it difficult for me (first gen Canadian Chinese) to enjoy. I think if you are personally further removed from the Chinese language and culture, you will actually enjoy it more, So consider it 3 or 4 stars if you are. Just don't think we necessarily actually speak that way.

My brother gave me this book to read when I was pregnant.He said it might help to get in touch with my emotions that I was keeping bottled up.Boy did it ever.Ms.Tan writes with emotion and depth that pulls you in and makes you believe.I have never cried and laughed so much while reading.After reading it you may want to hug someone..fair warning.

Couldn't put it down, but so emotionally gut-wrenching, I didn't want to read it more than once (my favs I usually read over and over). I did love this book - very interesting insight into a different culture and community than what I am familiar with - easily translatable and relatable to anyone. Loved it.

This book has some really good lessons. Unlike most reviewers, I didn't find the mothers and daughters hard to keep track of. The story may come off as boring and meticulous sensationalism, but most parts of this book are incredibly honest and profound; you just have to pay attention and think about what Tan is trying to say. I seriously believe it's aimed at an immigrant audience; if I dare say, Asian females.

Have you ever heard of a book called The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan. A book full of imagery, good choice of words that created pictures comes to life as if it was happen right in front of your own eyes. From the scale from one to ten, i would have to give it a nine because of the author careful of words. I love the way that Amy Tan created the picturso real "the peak looked like giant fried fish head trying to jump out of a vat of oil". The book comprised with many different types like mystery, adventure, romance, and fiction. if you like these type of book then you would love to read The Joy Luck Club.
This book is about how a daughter trying to learn her mother's secret with the help of her mother's best friend. But the story also included of the other four members and their daughter whom also came to the u.s during the world war 2. Each women tells thier stories throught flashback ans their recall of the difficult time growning up. when you finish this book i garantee you would want to read it over again

The Joy Luck Club is by far one of the best novels I have ever read. Though the many characters and Chinese names may be daunting for children under the age of thirteen, it is without a doubt a worthwhile read. While some of the characters seem to be a bit extremist, they take an all too real appearance through Amy Tan's simple yet profound writing style. Highly recommended.

A series of short stories woven into a continuous narrative, rather than a novel -- but superbly written all the same. Very human, and to my mind as durable as Pearl S. Buck's "The Good Earth." A successful autobiography of the contemporary American Chinese experience and its evolution through multiple generations in Chinese and Chinese-American families.

I first read this book nearly ten years ago and I can still remember passages of it that last for probably three pages. This was one of my first exposures to Chinese culture, and being introduced to China by someone who feels both inside and outside the culture felt like a rare privilege, a gift from someone who is generous and compelled to give away as much as she can.

This was also a welcome return to women protagonists after a college education that relied too heavily on male voices to tell most stories. The women in this book are strong -- headstrong and lifestrong -- and there's nothing "women's studies" about the writing here. This is a good book, period, no need to ghettoize it.

I really enjoyed reading this novel. At times I thought it was a little difficult to understand but the ideas expressed in the novel were great. My favorite scene is when one of the mothers tells her daughter that it is a waste of time to cry because it just gives the person you are crying over joy or satisfaction. That is only a tiny idea in the book, but this book is filled with a lot of thoughts and ideas to consider. THere are a lot of family ideas throuhout the novel that can be very interesting to read as well as informative. I would definitely recommend this novel to anyone. It is also much better than the movie.

The joyluck club is about the generations that four Chinese grandmothers would like to share with their daughters. It tells about the hardships each individual goes through in China when migrating to America and the sacrifices that had to encounter so that their daughters wouldn't hae to live as hard a life they did. Although each one of theirs daughters take their new lives for granted without realizing the hardships that the grandparents had to go through. Overall this book made me think of my own mom who migrated from japan. If her life was a shard as these particular charaters. I can see how I take things for advantage in my life to. I didn't like reading it although the book is greatly written it just didn't interet me as other books have.

The Joy Luck Club is a beautifully written novel that explores the delicate relationships, struggles and histories of four immigrant Chinese women and the lives of their four American-born daughters. The beauty of the book lies not only in its presentation of the Chinese culture, but also in its ability to represent the deeply complex mother/daughter relationships that cross all cultural boundaries.