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A Good Fall

by Ha Jin

3.65 of 5 stars 3.65 · rating details · 791 ratings · 152 reviews

In his first book of stories since The Bridegroom was published in 2000 ("Finely wrought . . . Every story here is cut like a stone."—Chicago Sun-Times), National Book Award–winning Ha Jin gives us a collection that delves into the experience of Chinese immigrants in America.

With the same profound attention to detail that is a hallmark of his previous acclaimed works of f...more

Hardcover, 240 pages

Published November 24th 2009 by Pantheon

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Aug 04, 2012 Sherri rated it 4 of 5 stars

A couple of book reviews back I told you I was hankering for a good set of short stories - and that is what I got from Jin's A Good Fall. Primarily set in Flushing, New York, these stories are filled with the Chinese immigrant experience - both young and
old.

One story is about 2 children who desperately want to change their Chinese names to more Americanized named and are oblivious to the emotional pain their grandparents feel because the children want to do this.

Another story is about a compose...more

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Aug 11, 2011 Aleeda added it

Ha Jin has written a poignant collection of stories exposing many facets of the Chinese immigrant experience. Immigrant life has never been easy, and issues were magnified exponentially after September 11, 2001.

While the stories are told from the viewpoints of the immigrants, the simple humanity of the situations will ring true for readers. Some examples: The Bane of the Internet, where an immigrant finds out that having day-in day-out access to relatives can have drawbacks; In the Crossfire, w...more

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Feb 10, 2010 Stephanie rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: china-and-chinese, immigrant-lit

In his previous book, the novel A Free Life, China-born American author Ha Jin wrote about life in the United States for the first time. In his fourth collection of short stories, he again turns his eye on his adopted homeland and focuses on how the lives of Chinese immigrants are still influenced by their ties to the motherland.

Unlike that novel, however, in which the writer brought his characters to life with affection and sympathy, these 12 short stories feel schematic, more focused on an ide...more In his previous book, the novel A Free Life, China-born American author Ha Jin wrote about life in the United States for the first time. In his fourth collection of short stories, he again turns his eye on his adopted homeland and focuses on how the lives of Chinese immigrants are still influenced by their ties to the motherland.

Unlike that novel, however, in which the writer brought his characters to life with affection and sympathy, these 12 short stories feel schematic, more focused on an idea than on creating convincing characters. You can appreciate what point about Chinese culture or modern society the writer is trying to get across in each of the stories but the engagement is intellectual rather than emotional.

In The Bane Of The Internet, a waitress struggling to make ends meet is forced to send money back to her younger sister in China, just so she can buy an expensive foreign car and save face. In the last, titular story, a monk cheated by a New York temple unintentionally rights an injustice via an act of desperation.

Despite a lack of compelling characters, the author does have a knack for finding that one image that strikes a chord. In the story In The Crossfire, a man’s scheme to get rid of his domineering mother is mixed with guilt: “He remembered that when he was taking the entrance exam fourteen years back, his parents had stood in the rain under a shared umbrella, waiting for him with a lunch tin, sodas, and tangerines wrapped in a handkerchief. They each had half a shoulder soaked through.”

And in The House Behind The Weeping Cherry, the tragedy of being an immigrant from as famous (or notorious) a country as China is captured, both farcically and poignantly, in the wail of a Chinese prostitute who has been let down by a condom: “I feel so awful to be Chinese here, because China always makes cheap products... China has degraded its people and let me down.”

Though the narrator’s response is to think, “How could an individual blame a country for her personal trouble?”, these stories seem to suggest that Chinese people have more reason to do so than most. (less)

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Jan 30, 2010 Amy rated it 5 of 5 stars

This book is a collection of short stories about Chinese immigrants and their new experience settling in New York. Some are relatively new transplants, while others have been in the US for many years. The process of immersing self into a new culture and place, while retaining cultural traditions and personal beliefs, is complex and bewildering to many of the characters.
The first compliment has to go to Ha Jin’s prose: clear, clean and crisp. Each story is astonishing in its simplicity, deceiving...more This book is a collection of short stories about Chinese immigrants and their new experience settling in New York. Some are relatively new transplants, while others have been in the US for many years. The process of immersing self into a new culture and place, while retaining cultural traditions and personal beliefs, is complex and bewildering to many of the characters.
The first compliment has to go to Ha Jin’s prose: clear, clean and crisp. Each story is astonishing in its simplicity, deceivingly so. Because none of the stories and life experiences are simple. He writes beautifully, making you care for this odd mix of people so much with so few words. I appreciated how he didn’t feel the need to over-explain the complications, he’s expecting his readers to have some basic knowledge about Chinese culture. Yet he still adds nuances of depth to these characters so you come away with new understanding of them and their plight, both individually and collectively.
For example, the Chinese have the well known reputation for respecting their ancestors far more than the American norm. While assimilating into American culture, some walk a fine line between behaving like everyone else or staying close to their cultural heritage. It’s not simple at all. An overbearing mother appears for the most part to be an obnoxious insertion into her son’s life, yet she is behaving in the norm. What is fascinating is how he relates to her, trying to respect her and her value system while keeping the peace with his wife. In the end, he makes a painful choice, because the two cannot be blended. Grandparents clinging to their past battle with grandchildren who only see their future, and in the middle a couple try and maintain respect and reasonableness for both generations.
In “A Composer and His Parakeets”, Fanlin finds that his new role as pet sitter for his girlfriend’s parakeet has more depth and meaning than his relationship with her. He finds inspiration, as well as happiness and contentment, by simply caring for the small needs of the little pet. He realizes that just as she had pawned the bird off to him, soon she would leave him. As he composes, his work actually improves significantly as he can openly express himself and not hold back
“The Bane of the Internet” shows the suffering of a newly immigrated woman who has to deal with the ease of keeping in contact with her family back home, one she thought she had escaped. While I laughed at some of her plight, the reality of her complaint is all too true.
In “An English Professor”, we watch a fully competent Chinese professor drive himself insane in his attempt to get tenure because he finds a typo in his application. The lengths he goes to in his desperation and pain, his paranoia and his lack of confidence are by turns humorous and tragic. Underlining it all is the intense drive to succeed and to save face, a theme that runs through many of the stories.
A few things surprised me. In immigrant communities, the newspaper business is still alive and well, a collection of news and trivia and anecdotal events that serve as background and a connection to culture. I found it fascinating that once immigrants have entered the US, they eagerly seek association with other immigrants from their past, even if these ones were not of their previous ‘class’ structure (who they would never have sought out back home). Their focus on financial and social standing remains, yet they desire to gather as family members to interact in the old ways.
As I read, I kept thinking of the phrase “what to keep”. Every single character in this has to make that decision, in small decisions and in large, in order to get what they wanted from the new land and remain faithful to their values. Ha Jin illuminates the complications and makes these lives and decisions of these ordinary people a fascinating chronicle of personal sacrifice.(less)

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May 04, 2012 Judy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Sue, Mikki?

Shelves: audiobook-e-book, short-story, new-york, usa, 2012-reads, favorites

Have you ever been glad you gave an author a second chance? I almost didn't with this one. After being so thoroughly disappointed with Waiting, I almost deleted this book of short stories from my computer. What stopped me was I only had one more download allowed from the library for several weeks and so I had to make-do with what I had...meaning it made sense to give Ha Jin one more shot at garnering my interest in his writing.

Unlike some collections of short stories, all of these entertained m...more

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Jan 19, 2012 Rusty rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

The author has written several tales detailing the experiences of Chinese immigrants in America. Some of the immigrants have been in the US for years whereas others are newly arrived. "The Beauty" is a story about a couple who has a homely baby. Fearing that the child is not his, the husband questions his wife only to discover that she, too, was once homely but had had plastic surgery to improve her appearance. "Children as Enemies" focuses on grandparents who cherish their heritage and find it...more

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Dec 06, 2010 Katherine rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

"Even at night he avoided the perch, sleeping with his claws clutching the side of the cage, his body suspended in the air. Isn't it tiring to sleep like that?" (14).
"...at this time it's hard to adjust to life here. In America it feels as if the older you are, the more inferior you grow" (80).
“Five weeks ago, Matt declared at dinner that he must change his last name because a substitute teacher that morning had mispronounced ‘Xi’ as ‘Eleven’” (83).
“The other day, exasperated, my wife wanted to...more

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Apr 05, 2010 Darryl rated it 5 of 5 stars

Ha Jin is one of my favorite writers, and this superb collection of short stories about Chinese immigrants to the United States is amongst his best works. These unconnected stories are all set in the Queens neighborhood of Flushing, a diverse NYC neighborhood with a majority Asian population. The characters come from different socioeconomic backgrounds, ranging from scholars to illegal aliens barely able to feed themselves. All struggle to fit into their new environments, and a common theme is a...more

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Feb 08, 2010 Bookmarks Magazine rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: mar-apr-2010

The talented Jin resumes his poignant examination of the conflicts inherent in the immigrant experience in these twelve stories, only two of which were previously unpublished. In simple, unadorned prose, often wryly humorous in its matter-of-fact observations, Jin crafts unique and believable characters, subtly molding them through the quiet details of their everyday lives. Jin's minimalism belies the dexterity with which he constructs each story and interweaves universal themes of hope, love, i...more

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Jan 19, 2013 Chenyu rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: asian

Probably because I am not a big fan of short stories, I feel like the stories always end to soon. It is really interesting to taste the life of others', but it is like talking to a stranger on the street for a few minutes and then farewell-you are not going to hear from them ever. Since I am also a new immigrant to America, these stories sound both old and fresh to me. I can understand some of their feelings to hometown but the daily life in Flushing is totally different to mine.
My favorite piec...more

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Jul 21, 2011 Alexander rated it 4 of 5 stars

A short collection of stories that are each simple, immensely readable, understated and (mostly) touching.

As in all of his books, Ha Jin's gift to the reader isn't sparkling prose or creativity but rather the the moving humanity he infuses all of his characters with. Though we know each of them only for a few brief pages, Ha Jin manages to make us feel and empathize with each one's frustrations, misgivings, triumphs and aspirations. This is no small feat, and is precisely what makes Mr. Jin such...more

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Jan 03, 2010 Renee rated it 5 of 5 stars

It must be a good omen if the first book I read in 2010 has a five star merit! Actually, I was somewhere between four and five stars, but the simplicity, honesty, attention to detail and beauty of this collection of short stories was a fantastic way to begin the new year. Primarily these stories focus on Flushing, one of New York City's largest Chinese immigrant communities. With startling clarity, Jin explores the challenges, loneliness and uplift associated with discovering one's place in Amer...more

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Sep 10, 2010 Abby rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-read-in-2010

Ha Jin writes stories of interesting people navigating mundane situations that nevertheless have profound, or meaningful, consequences.

His stories are good at examining small corners of everyday lives and exposing their larger significance (in often wryly funny details). He writes insightfully and poignantly about the struggles of Chinese immigrants adjusting to life in America and attempting to reconcile the differences between Old World and New.

Most of Ha Jin's work is from the perspective or...more

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May 07, 2010 Shivesh rated it 5 of 5 stars

This is an immensely readable collection of stories from a master writer, and it leaves you in disbelief that it ends so much sooner that you wanted to; in the end you will be left wanting more. Short story collections are a variable experience to say the least. The true masters of the form are sadly from another era: Hemingway, Kafka and Chekov (in no particular order). I think a lot of this is because of a definite lack of self-consciousness in their writing. The stories that really work are s...more This is an immensely readable collection of stories from a master writer, and it leaves you in disbelief that it ends so much sooner that you wanted to; in the end you will be left wanting more. Short story collections are a variable experience to say the least. The true masters of the form are sadly from another era: Hemingway, Kafka and Chekov (in no particular order). I think a lot of this is because of a definite lack of self-consciousness in their writing. The stories that really work are short, sharply focused and keenly observed. There is a *point* to their stories, not just a wild stab at some vague literary conceit. Disappointing (but vastly overhyped) short story authors like Jhumpa Lahiri get all the press but their stories have no heart. Unfortunately, with the coming of postmodernism and weird literary theories, short stories by our contemporary authors just aren’t as fun to read anymore because they are trying to prove a point or theme in their stories instead of just… telling a good story with believable characters. That is, most of the time.

Enter Ha Jin, a professor of English and a writer stuck in the netherworld of the “immigrant experience” who bases all his excellent writings in that world of shifting expectations and alliances. I guess you need to be an immigrant to truly understand and relate to it, but his success and good reviews suggest that his writing translates the experience for everyone. Being an immigrant or growing up as one is to be an alien in sea of strangers. Nothing is familiar to you but family. Sometimes your own face is unfamiliar to you, when your self-identification shifts so much. Eventually you grow up and move on, but it is nice to see a great writer tackle the alien experience in a collection such as this one.

The stories in this volume are very well selected, and each is a bit like a gem in a jewel-box. You just plunge your hand in and pick one out: there is the nicely paced story of a recently married couple who has an unpleasant family visitor in their apartment, finally scheming to send her back to China to preserve their sanity and marriage. There is another tale of a young monk, penniless and homeless in the shining city, alienated from humanity but unable to do much about it. There isn’t a better example of alienation and paranoia than that, and it is a good story to end the volume on.

All of the characters are familiar to us: we see them every day on the streets of our cities or towns. But their inner lives are so much different that what we may imagine, and it takes a book like this to expose that hidden facet of the people we notice. You can be assured that there is a beautiful and well imagined conclusion and resolution for every story. Ha Jin seems to start from the end and build his story backward… and it works incredibly well.(less)

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Apr 01, 2010 Emily rated it 3 of 5 stars

I rarely enjoy short stories. They always leave me hanging and I get ticked off. I always want the rest of the stories! These were fairly satisfying. They ended with enough resolution that I didn't get mad, but with enough questions left remaining that I could imaginate about them. I love that word: imaginate. It maybe not be a real word, but it sure has a nice ring to it.

I cannot imagine what it would be like to move to a totally different country. All the people in this book were Chinese immig...more

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Apr 06, 2010 Catherine rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2010, 50books_poc2010, china, mainstream-us, nonwhite_us

The format of this book really works against the stories within it. While there's to be said about the broad but shallow sampling you get from a series of short stories arranged around a theme - in this case exploring the experience of Chinese immigrants and immigrant-descendents in the United States - the reader has very little time to get to know the characters, establish empathy for them, or figure out a position on their situation / personality. There were several stories where I wished I we...more

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Sep 16, 2011 Isabelle rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is my first time reading Ha Jin's work. As I started to work my way through the book, one short story at a time, I felt something was missing somehow, although of course I could not say what nor how.
As I progressed through the collection of short stories, I realized that what made Jin's writing so fascinating was precisely this very undefinable ingredient that was missing still, story after story.
The stories all deal with the life of Chinese immigrants in New York, more specifically Flushin...more

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May 27, 2011 Kyle rated it 2 of 5 stars

Jin's collection of short stories focuses on the experiences of Chinese immigrants dealing with issues ranging from having to support family members still in China, forced prostitution to pay off the debt associated with coming to the United States, and grandparents dealing with Americanized grandchildren. Though the book did provide some insight on the challenges and difficulties immigrants face, it seemed the focus of the stories was these specific issues and not on the characters themselves....more

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Dec 23, 2009 Josh rated it 4 of 5 stars

I'm an unabashed Ha Jin lover, so of course I enjoyed this book. His books appeal to me because they give me a peek into the mindset of a culture that seems utterly alien in some respects, but no different in others. Ha Jin's characters have the same insecurities, desires and fears as anyone else, but they are expressed and dealt with differently because of the Chinese culture.

This collection was a hybrid of Jin's tales set in China and his latest novel, A Free Life, set in the American south....more

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Aug 26, 2012 Bookreaderljh rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-read-in-2012

I keep coming back to books of short stories but I'm really not a fan of the genre. I prefer depth when reading and in stories you just become committed to the characters or the plot and then it is done. Ha Jin writes very well - very realistic - and these vignettes of a life for a Chinese immigrant in New York City ring true and I learned a bit of the experience, but none of the stories really "stuck" with me. It is sort of like watching people on the street or hearing about someone at a cockta...more

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Aug 27, 2010 Marion rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is a compilation of stories based on comtemporary Chinese immigrant lives in Flushing Queens, NY. The spare prose heightens the sense of disparity between what one left behind and what now one faces in adjusting to a new culture. Some adjustments are impossible for the elderly who sell everything to move to America to live among family, only to discover that grandchildren consider them "guests" not to be honored or respected. Other stories highlight marital tension as ancient expectations o...more

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Jan 16, 2012 Mirande rated it 5 of 5 stars

I loved every story in this collection, but especially "A Composer and his Parakeets" and "The Beauty." His stories sometimes took a sharp turn at the end, but often did not, and there was no one structure or mode they stayed in. They could be harsh (but quickly so, without dragging out the point) in portraying attributes like greed--and so many overbearing in-laws made their way into the stories--but also compassionate in unexpected moments. There was a pervasive focus on food, the details of h...more

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Jan 26, 2010 Anne rated it 3 of 5 stars

All these stories, with many different voices, revolve around the struggles of Asian immigrants. Many are set in Flatbush--just a stop on a subway to me, hopefully a stop to financial independence for them. Their families, without exception, struggle in China, and demand financial help to maintain "face". As parents, our goal is to give our children love, independence, and skills/education. The Asian families in this book of short stories are sending out explorers to prosperous America so that t...more

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Jan 06, 2011 David Marxer rated it 4 of 5 stars

This collection of twelve stories set in Flushing New York in the present is a perfect follow up after the novel 'Free Life.' The Chinese immigrants not only deal with a tough new life in America, but with each other---older generation against younger, those living here thinking and sometimes battling with or for those in China.
My favorite stories are 'In the Crossfire' where a young couple trys just about everything to get an interferring mother to cut short her visit; 'Temporary Love' where a...more

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Mar 10, 2010 Karima rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is a collection of twelve short stories, all set in Flushing,NY, one of New York's largest Chinese immigrant communities.
I give this book only three stars (really, it deserves more, but I can't honestly say that I "really" liked it)because of it's vapid nature. I suspect the tone is intentional, and masterfully wrought, but the grey isolation left me with a bleak emptiness.
DO read this book. DO take pauses between stories. Digest slowly.

REC: "A Composer and His Parakeet" and "The Beauty."...more

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Apr 09, 2012 Taylar rated it 3 of 5 stars

I had previously read Ha Jin's novel "Waiting". "A Good Fall" is a collection of short stories. I like his stories because they deal with Chinese immigrants and Chinese Americans, and also because the stories are just snapshots. They start and end in the middle of the lives of the characters. They're not preachy, they're not pretentious, just stories glimpsing into the lives of others. His characters are relatable. His writing is simple. His themes range from love to immigration to morality to c...more

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Mar 03, 2010 David rated it 2 of 5 stars

A Good Fall by Ha Jin is much more uneven and to me unsatisfying. Jin is a master at creating character studies in recent Chinese immigrants to New York, but several of the stories read like excerpts from a longer memoir - the character arc was not wholly absent but was sufficiently subtle that I found myself wondering precisely what happened. I don't know if this is an intentional stylistic difference or is merely inelegant storytelling, but it did not appeal to me.

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Feb 08, 2011 Peggy rated it 4 of 5 stars

I don't usually like short stories because there aren't enough pages for character development and a satisfying plot, but I was pleasantly surprised by all of the stories in A Good Fall. Ha Jin is truely gifted as a story writer. Each story tells of the struggles of Chinese immigrants in Flushing, New York. Some are illegal and fear being found out. Most seem to struggle with employment. All struggle with meshing their Chinese traditions with their new country.

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Feb 28, 2010 Alice rated it 1 of 5 stars

Don't quite know what to think about this. Why all the raves??? I thought it was ok, just that. Most of the stories left me flat -- not surprised, not moved. Many of them ended with no resolution: maybe this is a sophisticated literary technique, but it doesn't work for me. There are many other short story writers (Try Lorrie Moore's Birds of America, for example) that I think deserve our time and attention. I'm disappointed in this book for sure.

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Jan 27, 2010 Beverly rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: asian, literary, short-stories, immigrants

Really interesting set of stories. Ha Jin's previous novels set in China always had a trapped feeling - the protags. had limited options and they circled around them unsure of what to do, disinclined to do anything. In these stories the characters have more choices, but are limited more by self-imposed problems than by external controls, so there is the same feeling of limitation and being trapped. This was less obvious in his first U.S. novel, A Free Life, but the feeling was there as well. Ha...more

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