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The Good Immigrant
- 26 Writers Reflect on America
- Narrated by: Emily Woo Zeller, full cast
- Length: 10 hrs and 31 mins
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The Good Immigrant
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Publisher's Summary
By turns heartbreaking and hilarious, troubling and uplifting, these "electric" essays come together to create a provocative, conversation-sparking, multivocal portrait of modern America (The Washington Post).
From Trump's proposed border wall and travel ban to the marching of white supremacists in Charlottesville, America is consumed by tensions over immigration and the question of which bodies are welcome. In this much-anticipated follow-up to the bestselling UK edition, hailed by Zadie Smith as "lively and vital," editors Nikesh Shukla and Chimene Suleyman hand the microphone to an incredible range of writers whose humanity and right to be here is under attack.
- Chigozie Obioma unpacks an Igbo proverb that helped him navigate his journey to America from Nigeria.
- Jenny Zhang analyzes cultural appropriation in 90s fashion, recalling her own pain and confusion as a teenager trying to fit in.
- Fatimah Asghar describes the flood of memory and emotion triggered by an encounter with an Uber driver from Kashmir.
- Alexander Chee writes of a visit to Korea that changed his relationship to his heritage.
These writers, and the many others in this urgent collection, share powerful personal stories of living between cultures and languages while struggling to figure out who they are and where they belong.
READ BY Emily Woo Zeller, Sebastián Villar Rojas, Teju Cole, Porochista Khakpour, Nicole Dennis-Benn, Rahawa Haile, Priya Minhas, Walé Oyéjidé, Fatimah Asghar, Tejal Rao, Jim St. Germain, Fatima Mirza, Alexander Chee, Yann Mounir Demange, Mona Chalabi, Jade Chang, Susanne Ramírez de Arellano, Basim Usmani, Jean Hannah Edelstein, Daniel José Older, Jenny Zhang, Chigozie Obioma, Maeve Higgins, Krutika Mallikarjuna, Dani Fernandez, and Chimene Suleyman
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
What the critics say
"This collection is a resounding success on multiple fronts. Its righteous rage is perfectly matched by its literary rewards...a surround-sound chorus that bristles with an unpredictable, electric energy...Each essay is a tantalizing introduction—and invitation—to the larger body of work these artists have already created and will continue to make long after this moment passes. What unites this defiant chorus of immigrant voices is best expressed in this variation on an enduring line by Langston Hughes: 'We, too sing America.'"—The Washington Post
"The strength of this collection is in its diversity—of gender, sexuality, privilege, experience, and writing style. A gift for anyone who understands or wants to learn about the breadth of experience among immigrants to the U.S., this collection showcases the joy, empathy, and fierceness needed to adopt the country as one's own."—PublishersWeekly (Starred Review)
"This book does what books can do better than other media: it devotes space to the shadowy ranges, to the subjects that are not easily graspable—the ineffable, varied, certainly never simple experiences of being an immigrant."—Rachel Khong, The Guardian