Name: Cranesong
ISBN: 9781948552042

Rona Wang

Cranesong explores the trauma that clutters our bones, the echoes that infuse our language, every dawn that insists on spinning into existence despite it all. At the same time, it lingers inside wild wind, consumes the cartography of longing, interrogates all the colors piano music can hold.

Cranesong

linda

I feel very lucky to know Rona and to have her as someone I can look up to. Rona is a beautiful writer with an incredible voice. In Cranesong, she captured the Chinese-American experience and brought light to queer sexuality - a rare and noteworthy intersection. 

It feels great to find your narrative in print, and that's what I enjoyed the most about this book. Computer science is "the cliché major everyone [is] doing." "You're so basic your pH level is 14" is an insult that would have made me smile. "My mother at least had been obsessed with the idea of me...her daughter was a high school senior, bound for college in Boston next year, full-ride, yes she was pre-med, wouldn't it be wonderful to have a doctor in the family?" A conversation I've overheard many times.

I liked "Style," "Seeking," and "The Art of Acceptance," probably "Seeking" the most. I liked the way Rona juxtaposed the double life that the narrator was living. Returning home on her Thanksgiving break, home became foreign. Her one-word responses to her parents' questions about college are not enough to cover the extent of what she is experiencing, and her parents will never fully understand. She does not expect them to. 

I also liked thinking about this book from the perspective of craft - it was interesting to read in the Acknowledgements section where each of these pieces originated. I haven't written fiction in a long time, but I'm starting to appreciate again the freedom that fiction affords. Maybe I'll try it out sometime soon.

Cranesong

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