Literature & Fiction
![K-Ming Chang - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_a_kming_chang.jpg)
Gods of Want: Stories
Startling stories that center the bodies, memories, myths, and relationships of Asian American women, in the vein of the electrifying relationships in Killing Eve and Yellowjackets-from the National Book Award "5 Under 35" honoree and author of Bestiary
"Wise, energetic, funny, and wild, Gods of Want displays a boundless imagination anchored by the weight of ancestors and history."-Kali Fajardo-Anstine, author of Sabrina & Corina and Woman of Light
In "Auntland," a steady stream of aunts adjust to American life by sneaking surreptitious kisses from women at temple, buying tubs of vanilla ice cream to prepare for citizenship tests, and hatching plans to name their daughters "Dog." In "The Chorus of Dead Cousins," ghost-cousins cross space, seas, and skies to haunt their live-cousin, wife to a storm chaser. In "Xífù," a mother-in-law tortures a wife in increasingly unsuccessful attempts to rid the house of her. In "Mariela," two girls explore one another's bodies for the first time in the belly of a plastic shark, while in "Virginia Slims," a woman from a cigarette ad comes to life. And in "Resident Aliens," a former slaughterhouse serves as a residence to a series of widows, each harboring her own calamitous secrets.
With each tale, K-Ming Chang gives us her own take on a surrealism that mixes myth and migration, corporeality and ghostliness, queerness and the quotidian. Stunningly told in her feminist fabulist style, these are uncanny stories peeling back greater questions of power and memory.
"Wise, energetic, funny, and wild, Gods of Want displays a boundless imagination anchored by the weight of ancestors and history."-Kali Fajardo-Anstine, author of Sabrina & Corina and Woman of Light
In "Auntland," a steady stream of aunts adjust to American life by sneaking surreptitious kisses from women at temple, buying tubs of vanilla ice cream to prepare for citizenship tests, and hatching plans to name their daughters "Dog." In "The Chorus of Dead Cousins," ghost-cousins cross space, seas, and skies to haunt their live-cousin, wife to a storm chaser. In "Xífù," a mother-in-law tortures a wife in increasingly unsuccessful attempts to rid the house of her. In "Mariela," two girls explore one another's bodies for the first time in the belly of a plastic shark, while in "Virginia Slims," a woman from a cigarette ad comes to life. And in "Resident Aliens," a former slaughterhouse serves as a residence to a series of widows, each harboring her own calamitous secrets.
With each tale, K-Ming Chang gives us her own take on a surrealism that mixes myth and migration, corporeality and ghostliness, queerness and the quotidian. Stunningly told in her feminist fabulist style, these are uncanny stories peeling back greater questions of power and memory.
Editorial Reviews
"These stories glitter and pulse, announcing Chang, with her second book, as a front-runner of innovation anew. Full of mythic desire, joy and pain disguised as the other, and navigating the precarious balance of how to belong to a land while still belonging to oneself, Gods of Want is bursting with language and images so striking, so sure of their own strength, I found myself stunned. The worlds and characters depicted in these pages are original, strange, sometimes-horrific, and all the more gorgeous because of it."-Dantiel W. Moniz, author of Milk Blood Heat
"In the genre of feminine madness, these stories are to be worshipped. They are fearless, hysterical, violent yet full of grace. Each sentence escalates toward devastating, poetic insight about our bodies, about cultural demands both treasured and feared, and about what makes being alive a terror and a joy."-Venita Blackburn, author of How to Wrestle a Girl
"The beauty, humor, and brilliance throughout Gods of Want shines brightly from story to story-Chang's collection is constantly illuminating and thoroughly astounding. K-Ming Chang's mastery of language, and the boundlessness of her empathy, make for a strange, hilarious, and unforgettable read. Gods of Want is a gift and a master class, a stunning and moving work by one of our most brilliant authors."-Bryan Washington, author of Lot and Memorial
"This book traces a line from old worlds to new worlds by means of the bloody umbilical cords that stretch between them. . . . These stories unthread the tangled relationships between mothers and daughter, aunts and cousins, siblings and lovers . . . a lingering sense that language, as well as life, is infinitely adaptable, no matter the ground on which it is given to grow. Lurid, funny, strange, and deftly sorrowing-an important new voice."-Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Chang returns with a dazzling collection of stories within stories that draw on old myths to embody the heartache and memories of Asian American women. Chang's bold conceits and potent imagery evoke a raw, visceral power that captures feelings of deep...
"In the genre of feminine madness, these stories are to be worshipped. They are fearless, hysterical, violent yet full of grace. Each sentence escalates toward devastating, poetic insight about our bodies, about cultural demands both treasured and feared, and about what makes being alive a terror and a joy."-Venita Blackburn, author of How to Wrestle a Girl
"The beauty, humor, and brilliance throughout Gods of Want shines brightly from story to story-Chang's collection is constantly illuminating and thoroughly astounding. K-Ming Chang's mastery of language, and the boundlessness of her empathy, make for a strange, hilarious, and unforgettable read. Gods of Want is a gift and a master class, a stunning and moving work by one of our most brilliant authors."-Bryan Washington, author of Lot and Memorial
"This book traces a line from old worlds to new worlds by means of the bloody umbilical cords that stretch between them. . . . These stories unthread the tangled relationships between mothers and daughter, aunts and cousins, siblings and lovers . . . a lingering sense that language, as well as life, is infinitely adaptable, no matter the ground on which it is given to grow. Lurid, funny, strange, and deftly sorrowing-an important new voice."-Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Chang returns with a dazzling collection of stories within stories that draw on old myths to embody the heartache and memories of Asian American women. Chang's bold conceits and potent imagery evoke a raw, visceral power that captures feelings of deep...
Short Excerpt Teaser
Auntland
I had an aunt who went to the dentist and asked to get her tongue pulled. We only do teeth, the dentist said, but did it anyway. She took her tongue home in a jar and flushed it down the toilet and years later a fisherman in Half Moon Bay made the evening news, waving my aunt's tongue like a flag at the end of his pole. The police are still looking for the body it belonged to. I had an aunt who worked at the Oriental Buffet and stole us a live crab, which my other aunt boiled alive, and when I tried to crack the legs with my teeth the way they did, one of my molars fractured into five and my other aunt, not that other aunt but this other other aunt, spent the rest of the night tweezing tooth-shrapnel out of my gums. I had an aunt who told me not to get braces because it would set off the metal detector at airports and trigger the German shepherds to run out and tackle me and the agents would confiscate my teeth and replace them with rubber bullets and interrogate my mouth with their tongues. I had an aunt who took me to Great America while my mother was at an immigration interview. This aunt refused to get on a roller coaster even though that's what we paid for. When I told her to get on, she said, The only time I'll get off the ground is if I'm on an airplane or become an angel. And I told her she'd never become an angel because I saw her kiss a woman that time we were at Costco buying four-ply toilet paper for my mother, who was in the throes of stress diarrhea, induced partially by her upcoming immigration interview and partially because I told her the officers would test if she was truly American by feeding her strawberry soft serve and timing her digestion. I said that's why it's called passing a test-because they catch what passes out of your body. If it's liquid, they don't let you into the country. So my mother went out and bought two half-gallons of Breyers vanilla to train her body to convert milk into bone and not brown silk. Anyway, my aunt locked me in the parked car, which I said was illegal in America-you can't even lock dogs in the car-and she walked up to the woman who had been following us while we shopped, a woman I'd recognized from the temple where we prayed to save my grandfather's polygamist soul, and kissed her. Kissed her so hard, my own lips shriveled like salted slugs. I had an aunt who gave me the lingerie catalog because there were coupons printed in it, though none of us would ever wear underwear with jewels or lace, because jewels and lace need to be worn on the outside so that everyone knows you can afford them. I cut the bottom halves off the women for no reason. At school we watched an Oprah interview where a white woman tells Oprah how she stopped her attacker: by peeing on him. I had an aunt who peed on me one time we shared a mattress. She'd been in the country five months and when I woke up she was trying to shroud the stain with a towel. She said she'd dreamed of being back on the island, peeing onto the roots of a camphor tree that didn't grow unless it was given water directly from a body. I imagined I was that tree: I grew because my aunts were watering me. I had an aunt who cut my hair for years, until she got early-onset something, some disease named after a man, and then she went around cutting people's earlobes on purpose, sneaking up behind them with her scissors and shearing off the tips like bits of shrubbery, and for years every time I sensed something behind me, a pigeon or the gym teacher or rain, I assumed it was her. I covered my ears in my sleep, could never hear in my dreams. I had an aunt who swathed cellophane candy wrappers around the heads of flashlights and shined the beams onto my ceiling before I fell asleep, telling me it was the northern lights, and when I asked her what even caused the northern lights, she said it was the sky having bad breath. The sky spitting its stars like teeth. When night is the color of all my aunts letting down their hair, I remember I have another aunt who got all her teeth bashed in on a bus. She doesn't remember the man who did it, just woke up at the end of the line with the bus driver slapping her awake, telling her she better learn some English, so she did. I had an aunt who said chewing orchid petals is the only sure form of birth control. I had another aunt who said dying is the only sure form of birth control. I had an aunt who wanted to name her daughter Dog because that's what Americans love most of all, dogs, and how many movies are there about American dogs that must find their way home to their families? And h...
I had an aunt who went to the dentist and asked to get her tongue pulled. We only do teeth, the dentist said, but did it anyway. She took her tongue home in a jar and flushed it down the toilet and years later a fisherman in Half Moon Bay made the evening news, waving my aunt's tongue like a flag at the end of his pole. The police are still looking for the body it belonged to. I had an aunt who worked at the Oriental Buffet and stole us a live crab, which my other aunt boiled alive, and when I tried to crack the legs with my teeth the way they did, one of my molars fractured into five and my other aunt, not that other aunt but this other other aunt, spent the rest of the night tweezing tooth-shrapnel out of my gums. I had an aunt who told me not to get braces because it would set off the metal detector at airports and trigger the German shepherds to run out and tackle me and the agents would confiscate my teeth and replace them with rubber bullets and interrogate my mouth with their tongues. I had an aunt who took me to Great America while my mother was at an immigration interview. This aunt refused to get on a roller coaster even though that's what we paid for. When I told her to get on, she said, The only time I'll get off the ground is if I'm on an airplane or become an angel. And I told her she'd never become an angel because I saw her kiss a woman that time we were at Costco buying four-ply toilet paper for my mother, who was in the throes of stress diarrhea, induced partially by her upcoming immigration interview and partially because I told her the officers would test if she was truly American by feeding her strawberry soft serve and timing her digestion. I said that's why it's called passing a test-because they catch what passes out of your body. If it's liquid, they don't let you into the country. So my mother went out and bought two half-gallons of Breyers vanilla to train her body to convert milk into bone and not brown silk. Anyway, my aunt locked me in the parked car, which I said was illegal in America-you can't even lock dogs in the car-and she walked up to the woman who had been following us while we shopped, a woman I'd recognized from the temple where we prayed to save my grandfather's polygamist soul, and kissed her. Kissed her so hard, my own lips shriveled like salted slugs. I had an aunt who gave me the lingerie catalog because there were coupons printed in it, though none of us would ever wear underwear with jewels or lace, because jewels and lace need to be worn on the outside so that everyone knows you can afford them. I cut the bottom halves off the women for no reason. At school we watched an Oprah interview where a white woman tells Oprah how she stopped her attacker: by peeing on him. I had an aunt who peed on me one time we shared a mattress. She'd been in the country five months and when I woke up she was trying to shroud the stain with a towel. She said she'd dreamed of being back on the island, peeing onto the roots of a camphor tree that didn't grow unless it was given water directly from a body. I imagined I was that tree: I grew because my aunts were watering me. I had an aunt who cut my hair for years, until she got early-onset something, some disease named after a man, and then she went around cutting people's earlobes on purpose, sneaking up behind them with her scissors and shearing off the tips like bits of shrubbery, and for years every time I sensed something behind me, a pigeon or the gym teacher or rain, I assumed it was her. I covered my ears in my sleep, could never hear in my dreams. I had an aunt who swathed cellophane candy wrappers around the heads of flashlights and shined the beams onto my ceiling before I fell asleep, telling me it was the northern lights, and when I asked her what even caused the northern lights, she said it was the sky having bad breath. The sky spitting its stars like teeth. When night is the color of all my aunts letting down their hair, I remember I have another aunt who got all her teeth bashed in on a bus. She doesn't remember the man who did it, just woke up at the end of the line with the bus driver slapping her awake, telling her she better learn some English, so she did. I had an aunt who said chewing orchid petals is the only sure form of birth control. I had another aunt who said dying is the only sure form of birth control. I had an aunt who wanted to name her daughter Dog because that's what Americans love most of all, dogs, and how many movies are there about American dogs that must find their way home to their families? And h...
