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I happened to be on an upswing of enthusiasm about reading shortly after the election, which prompted me to find small pockets in my day where I could fit reading time. At the end of a weekday, all I usually want to do is shut off my brain via the television before collapsing in bed, but I’ve long fantasized about closing the day with a book in bed. The one thing I knew I wanted, nay, needed, out of a bedside book was levity. I was not out here trying to tailspin before closing my eyes–I already had the prospect of four years of a Trump presidency to do that for me. I needed something that didn’t shy away from the truth of who we are as a country, including all the complexities that come with our various and collective identities, without making me seriously consider moving to another country.
When I looked at the stack of reader copies I had amassed, my eyes lingered on the cover of the book I’m recommending today. I mean, that cover is literal fire. Also, I have a soft spot for books released in December, which this book is, because they sometimes get short shrift, what with all the best of lists being released as early as October—and I know that, like Book Riot, many content creators are reading ahead, but it’s fair to say December releases tend to get less traction. So I chose this book, and it turned out to be exactly what I was looking for and, yes, needed.
Rental House by Weike Wang
I missed the train on Wang’s debut hit, Chemistry, but I heard great things about her writing. I took it as an omen when I got an email about her third book and said yes to what sounded like a compelling slice of life from the perspective of a married couple–one, the daughter of Chinese immigrants, and the other, the son of poor, rural white parents. Keru and Nate meet at the Ivy League college they both attend, so as you might imagine, they’re both driven and focused on improving their circumstances but for different reasons and in different ways. The story focuses on the couple after college in full adulthood, at the start and then the peak of their careers, years into their marriage. Their perspectives are informed by where they came from and what their respective families expect from them, and when I say this, I don’t necessarily mean they attend to their families’ desires about who they should be and what they should offer.
We examine the ways Keru and Nate differ, their dynamics and collisions with each other and each other’s families, through the looking glass of various AirBnB-style rentals. There’s a scene where Nate’s white mother, who’s baffled by negative reactions to her cringey, xenophobic comments about Keru and her family, gets in the face of a Karen who threatens her Chinese American daughter-in-law. It’s a moment that leaves you grappling with contradictions you find in real life where people and families are messy, and ignorance doesn’t always beget full-time bigotry. Rental House is more than an examination of two people from very different worlds: it’s also a story about marriage—how you stick up for the person you love and how you fail them, the tricky power dynamics that can crop up, and how you might roll on despite your differences in the best way you can. It was the right bedtime story for now and for where I’m at in my life.
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