My first review: Starred, from Publishers Weekly
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 29, 2007
My agent, Larry Weissman, sent me my review in Publishers Weekly (scroll 1/3 of the way down), which is out today :
* The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food
Jennifer 8. Lee. Hachette/Twelve,
$24.99 (308p) ISBN 978-0-446-58007-6
Readers will take an unexpected and entertaining journey—through culinary, social and cultural history—in this delightful first book on the origins of the
customary after-Chinese-dinner treat by New York Times reporter Lee. When a large number of Powerball winners in a 2005 drawing revealed that mass-printed paper fortunes were to blame, the author (whose middle initial is Chinese for “prosperityâ€) went in search of the backstory. She tracked the winners down to Chinese restaurants all over America, and the paper slips the fortunes are written on back to a Brooklyn company. This travellike narrative serves as the spine of her cultural history—not a book on Chinese cuisine, but the Chinese food of take-out-and-delivery—and permits her to frequently but safely wander off into various tangents related to the cookie.
There are satisfying minihistories on the relationship between Jews and Chinese
food and a biography of the real General Tso, but Lee also pries open factoids and tidbits of American culture that eventually touch on large social and cultural subjects such as identity, immigration and nutrition. Copious research backs her many lively anecdotes, and being American-born Chinese yet willing to scrutinize herself as much as her objectives, she wins the reader over. Like the numbers on those lottery fortunes, the book’s a winner. (Mar.)
Nutrition? I’m glad I added that (very brief) section…paragraph.
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Maybe she really really liked their crispy shredded beef?
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 29, 2007
A British millionaireness who died and left her $20 million fortune to her favorite Chinese restaurant owners is now having her will challenged in court by her surviving relatives.
Golda “Goldie” Bechal died aged 89 in January 2004, leaving the bulk of her estate to her friends Kim Sing Man and his wife Bee Lian Man. But five nephews and nieces claim the old lady was suffering from serious dementia and “lacked testamentory capacity” when she made her will. They also said the Man family had arrived on the scene in the 1990s.
But the judge was shown a photograph album showing Ms. Bechal at the opening of the Man family restaurant in 1969, and subsequent photos of holidays and family gatherings.
In testimony, Mr. Man said s. Bechal “always enjoyed her Chinese pickled leeks and bean sprouts, which I bought for her.”
Topics: Chinese Restaurants, Quirky | No Comments »
My first review is out next Monday in Publishers Weekly
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 28, 2007
Which is weird to think — the idea of being formally reviewed. Publishers Weekly is one of the big four industry trade publications. The others are Kirkus, Library Journal and Booklist. PW did ask for the image of the orange book cover because they might feature it on their table of contents, which Cary assures me is a good thing.
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Ted Kennedy’s memoir goes to Twelve for a reported $8 million
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 27, 2007
After a six-day auction between nine publishers, Twelve landed Ted Kennedy’s memoir for a reported $8+ million “people close to the negotiations said.” That’s an impressive coup for Jon Karp and Twelve. ($8 million is the ballpark amount for what Hillary Clinton and Tony Blair got for their autobiographies). The book, tentatively scheduled to come out in 2010, builds upon the oral history project that Kennedy has been working on through the Miller Center of the University of Virginia. He’s the first Kennedy in his generation to write an autobiography and the second longest serving senator after Robert Byrd of West Virginia. The project, launched in 2004 and expected to last several years, will include interviews with the senator, family members, colleagues, journalists, foreign leaders and others.
Kennedy’s agent was Robert B. Barnett, a Washington lawyer profiled on the front page of the New York Times by Sheryl Stolberg for charging hourly, rather than with a percentage basis for negotiating book deals for the Washington elite.
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My book on world tour (well…only to the UK)
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 24, 2007
So my galley went on a trip to the UK and friends sent me a photo of my book galley from Oxford… It also went to Scotland (and maybe Wales too? actually I think it skipped Wales) on this trip. (Btw. I used Splashup.com to edit it online. Amazing. It’s Photoshop in your browser)
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Think Valentines’s Day is most romantic day in Chinatown? Try Thanksgiving
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 22, 2007
The most romantic day in Chinatown is not Valentine’s (because of cupids) or Christmas (because of the mistletoe), it is Thanksgiving. Why?
On the fourth Thursday in November, hundreds of white bridal gowns rustle in the streets of Chinatown.
More weddings take place in Chinatown on that one single day for one simple reason: it’s the only day that the nation’s Chinese restaurant workers can get consistently off.
To keep up with American demand for Chinese food, Chinese restaurant workers have to wait tables, deliver meals, wash dishes or stir woks some 364 days a year.
Thus 50,000 people, the majority of whom are Chinese restaurant workers, flood Chinatown every Thanksgiving as they are from six- or seven-day a week jobs. It is one of the rare opportunities to when they can coordinate with family and friends to celebrate. Banquet halls have to be booked more than a year in advance, compared to the one or two months that is standard for other times of the years.
Susan Sachs’ had a fun piece in The New York Times a few years back describing the frenzied wedding preparations. The pictures above and below are from Thanksgiving 2005 when I went into Chinatown and followed a bunch of wedding celebrations throughout the day.
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Fortune cookies (and me) on CBS News Sunday Morning
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 16, 2007
I am scheduled to be on CBS News Sunday Morning for their food episode as a fortune cookie expert. (Not directly related to the book, but how many English-speaking fortune cookie experts are there in the world).
We shot at Shun Lee a few days ago, with a plate of fortune cookies delectably placed on the table between me and the interviewer.
TV is funny. Lots of lights and logistics and cables and things that are unnatural made to look natural. As a print journalist you show up with your pen and pad and you are ready to go. We are minimalist.
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No justice! No noodles! Restaurant workers stand up for their rights
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 14, 2007
I did a blog post on City Room on Wednesday about Chinese restaurant workers organizing for City Room. With chants of “No Justice! No Noodles!†(you got to love that) Chinese restaurant workers called for a boycott of Ollie’s Noodle Shop and Grill restaurants yesterday, claiming that the president of the popular restaurant chain was leading a retaliation and blacklisting effort against restaurant workers.
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I’ve booked my first public reading with the Geography of Bliss
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 14, 2007
Eric Weiner and I will be doing a joint public reading at KGB Bar, an East Village establishment where people can indulge in spirits and literature at 85 East 4th Street, tenatively scheduled for Tuesday, March 11. (Tuesdays apparently is their non-fiction night). Eric’s book, The Geography of Bliss, is the January book on Twelve list (so two before mine). And its’ really quite spectacular and fun. A self-described grump (his last name really is pronounced like “whiner”) who has covered a whole bunch of wars and conflicts for NPR, Eric decides he is instead going to go visit the world’s happiest places and learn their secrets. The reason I liked it is that while there have been a whole spate of Happiness books in the last year or two, they are generally recycling a lot of the same research. His is new, because it takes some of the known academic research and interweaves it with random funny David Sedaris-like travelogue and insightful punchiness. Definitely recommended. I actually gave away my galley copy to a friend who was going overseas to study, and then tried to hunt down another copy again for myself since Cary Goldstein, our publicist, wouldn’t give me another one from his stash. He said that I would thank him when he was that fiercely protective of my galleys.
Topics: Chinese Food | No Comments »
Found in Translation: How does Asian ethnic food become American
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 14, 2007
I went to the packed NYU/James Beard Foundation event last night — Found in Translation: An Exploration of How Asian Cuisines Become Part of the American Culinary Landscape. Event was totally full. Wait list galore. People (luckily for me) are absolutely fascinated by food talks. And to its credit, it was a pretty diverse crowd in all respects — age, race, dress. Except, I guess, all foodies.
Topics: Chinese Food, Chinese Restaurants | No Comments »
The Top 100 Chinese Restaurants (Really the top 1,000, but who’s counting) annual awards banquet
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 13, 2007
This past Sunday I attended Chinese Restaurant News 4th Annual Top 100 Chinese Restaurants Awards Banquet, which was held at the New Yorker Hotel in New York City.
I attended with my friends Nolan and Mike. Most of it was in Chinese, so it was like “white noise” (or “yellow noise” as one of them put it) to their ears but very enjoyable in that random ethnic way.
One of the more interesting aspects is what do you serve at a Chinese banquet at a Western hotel? This is has been a concern for many of my Chinese American friends who want to get married yet serve Chinese food. Some things worked better than others… more »
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I’ve updated my list of chapters
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 11, 2007
This morning, now that I am back from an insane series of book dinners, I put the list of my chapters online as people seem to be blogging now about my galleys (Eater had a scuffle and Mae’s Food Blog has had multiple posts.)
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A book dedication to Ms. Right and the yet-to-be-born
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 11, 2007
My friend Shawn and I were IMing about our dedications in our books. I dedicated mine to my parents (“For Mom and Dad, who left their homeland so their children could follow their passions, and for all other moms and dads who have done the same.”)
But his, the best I have ever seen, takes a jab at the pretentiousness of dedications and acknowledgments. It literally made me burst out laughing when it came across my screen:
“To my future wife and kids, who,
when I meet and conceive them,
respectively,
will likely be my love and inspiration.”
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Confucius say, You will vote for Obama?
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 11, 2007
Reporters at the Jefferson Jackson dinner in Iowa were scarfing done fortune cookies provided by Barack Obama’s presidential campaign as they were the only things they had to eat. Per Garance’s France-Ruta‘s observations:
The Obama campaign’s Iowa spokesman Tommy Vietor walked by the press riser, at one point, tossing fortune cookies to reporters and cameramen, like fish to waiting seals. Cracked open, the cookies contained the message, “Paid for By Obama for America,†with a little union bug. On the reverse, they read “Iowans Will Caucus for Obama†and “You are fired up. Obama is ready to go.â€
Here is a slightly out-of-focus fortune presented by Ana Marie Cox.
Those are actually pretty bad fortunes (Barack Obama needs new fortune cookie writers, or his speechwriters needs to get in on the game). But fortune cookies have a long history in political campaigns, specifically presidential ones. In 1960 alone (the first recorded time they were used in a political season), they were used in both the Adlai Stevenson campaign and the Stuart Symington campaign. Abraham Beame used them in his 1965 New York mayoral race and someone even presented presented Chicago Mayor Richard Daley with green fortune cookies as a prank in 1972.
(Thanks to Tait Sye for passing along the Obama tip)
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Cary Goldstein, book publicist extraordinaire
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 9, 2007
Cary Goldstein (very patiently) trekked across five cities with me to attend dinners that he and his assistant Carolyn had carefully arranged. As my friend Nicole (who attended two dinners, in Boston and San Francisco) put it, you couldn’t even tell he was a publicist at the dinner. It’s amazing what a good book publicist can do. We had not just booksellers and media at the dinners, but librarians, bloggers and people from institutes like the Nixon Library and the Asia Society. And the thing is, with 12 books a year, he works all the time. Anyway, Cary and I were talking about what it takes to be a publicist — of any sort. And a large part of that these days is authenticity (this is a word I’ve been hearing a lot these days) because a reporter, producer, editor, whatever can sense if you really believe in what you are pitching. I know I can sense it in the age of hired guns. I will often take the time to help an earnest pitcher, even if I am not the person who can write about it.
When Jon Karp went looking for a publicist, instead of asking people @ publicity houses, he asked book review editors who they liked working with (smart). Cary’s name came up again and again. Interestingly, Carly is not just a publicist for the imprint, he also is an editor. He acquires one work of literary fiction a year. Anyway here is the original press release, when Cary joined Twelve in May 2006, from Jon Karp, which has been true.
I am delighted to announce that Cary Goldstein has been named Director of Publicity and Acquiring Editor for Warner Twelve.
Cary comes to Warner Twelve from Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, where he is Assistant Director of Publicity and Director of Web Publicity. He has worked on numerous acclaimed books, including The Assassin’s Gate by George Packer, Sweet and Low by Rich Cohen, and Mirror to America by John Hope Franklin.
He has also been instrumental in breaking out new voices in fiction and nonfiction, including David Bezmozgis, author of Natasha; Emily Barton, author of Brookland; Paul Elie, author of The Life You Save Might Be Your Own; Christopher Sorrentino, author of Trance, which was nominated for the National Book Award; Jonathan Mahler, author of Ladies and Gentlemen, The Bronx is Burning; and Noah Feldman, author of After Jihad.
Prior to his work at FSG, Cary was a senior publicist for Basic Books, Director of National Poetry Month for The Academy of American Poets, and buyer and features editor for Barnes & Noble.com. He is a 1996 graduate of New York University, where he was editor of The Gallatin Review and The Minetta Review and recipient of the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Poetry Prize.
When I began the search for a Director of Publicity, I asked book review editors to name the most inventive and dynamic publicist they’d encountered. The first person mentioned was Cary Goldstein, and I quickly discovered why. As Cary and I have gotten to know each other over the past six months and I’ve learned of his accomplishments at FSG, I’ve seen again and again just how talented, committed, effective, and well-regarded he is.
In addition to being the architect of our publicity strategy, Cary will also be acquiring and editing at least one major work of literary fiction a year, and contributing his ideas to the publishing campaigns for each of our twelve books. He will be an essential partner in the launch of this imprint, and I am thrilled to be working with him.
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It’s cold in LA
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 9, 2007
wtf.
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Our copyeditors seem to like it thus far…
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 9, 2007
My editors have been telling me that the copy editors who have been working on the book, have said nice things about it. (three cheers for copy editors, they catch the most amazing thing). One email forwarded to me by one of the copy editors:
I did manage to get it back one day sooner than the extended deadline but couldn’t pull it up any further–it did actually need quite a bit of work. On the plus side, it’s really marvelous. I was so focused on the work I was doing moment by moment that I never pulled back enough to mention to the author how good a book it is–fabulous and wide-ranging research, interesting parallels drawn and conclusions reached. She also manages to take what at first seem like disparate chapters and weave them together, both factually and thematically. It’s all really quite fascinating. So if it’s possible, please pass my compliments along to her.
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Galley demand
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 9, 2007
From one of the sales reps …to the publicist after the prepub dinner in Seattle @ House of Hong. Which is in theory, why we do the tour in the first place, so yay.
Hi, Jennifer 8 Lee was such a hit in Seattle that my accounts are clambering for more galleys. Can you send about 10 more my way? Thanks.
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I’m going to lose my voice by the end of this week
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 7, 2007
meep.
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A real General Tso — actually General Cao
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 5, 2007
Someone pointed to me that the defense minister is named Cao Gangchuan. He is a real General Cao, which is (more or less, though you can’t tell unless you know pinyin) pronounced General Tso, as Americans pronounced.
Except of course, that General Tso is actually General Zuo Zongtang, and Zuo is pronounced, roughly, like “juoh.” (Why are we eating his chicken? That’s a question for another day.)
Ask me about General Ching one day.
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A mad rush of a pre-pub tour: four dinners in four cities in four days
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 5, 2007
This week I am on a pre-publication tour, going to different cities and having dinner at (where else?) Chinese restaurants with booksellers and local media. Julie Bosman does a nice job explaining the motivation for pre-pub tours in this piece from The New York Times.
As she writes:
Unlike the postpublication book tour, which focuses on publicity and public appearances, the pre-publication tour is meant to win the hearts of the front-line soldiers in the bookselling trenches, and more and more publishers are finding it an indispensable part of their marketing plan.
While major decisions are left to the bookstore chains’ influential buyers, the people out in the field — the store managers and the clerks — can wield considerable power over how long books continue to be displayed on prime tables at the front of the store, and therefore over the what their customers choose to buy and read.
and
Morgan Entrekin, the publisher of Grove/Atlantic, is credited with inventing the pre-publication tour a decade ago when he circled the country with Charles Frazier, the author of “Cold Mountain.†The book was a smash, selling 1.6 million copies in hardcover and spending 61 weeks on the New York Times best-seller list in hardcover and 33 in paperback.
In a business that is becoming increasingly driven by online retailing and corporate buying decisions, booksellers are all too eager to meet authors and publishers in person.
We are doing Washington, Boston, Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles. Chicago was originally on the list but we were like, no. The cities were picked because of either a connection with me, strong Asian interest or strong independent bookseller scene, or some combination thereof.
I ended up having to talk continuously at the dinner and I have props (I was very good at share and tell in 1st grade). My voice is hoarse, and I often don’t end up eating. Anyway. It’s very odd having people show up at a dinner because of you, thear you speak. Especially if you are a journalist, when you like to be the voyeur and not the voyant.
My friends are like, “But isn’t that what your parties are like?” Actually no. Most people go to my parties for the other people, not for me. I can put two people together and tell them to talk to each other, and walk away. I do not have to entertain them. They can entertain each other, especially if there is alcohol involved. Have I mentioned I am responsible (directly or indirectly) for four weddings — and I have a few more things in the pipeline. If I were Jewish, I would be on my way to heaven, with one to spare.
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Chinese women don’t get fat, but American women who eat (American) Chinese food do
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 2, 2007
I thought this piece from Calorie Labs had such a cute title that I am citing it, even though it is citing old news. Basically in March the Center for Science in the Public Interest released a study (their second) on American Chinese food and discovered it is bad for you. This always gets a lot of media play.
Anyway, it is true-ish. American Chinese food is bad for you because American-anything cuisine is pretty bad for you — because Americans favor things which are deepfried, sweetish and heavy in meat. But Chinese Chinese food (which features a lot more vegetables, seafood, tofu and less frying, less meat) is pretty good for you. So Chinese people who come to the United States and thus deal with American food become a lot less healthier.
Chinese people in China are always perplexed when I show them a photo of General Tso’s chicken (which they don’t have in China) — one guy asked me “Is that oxtail?”
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There really are two menus in Chinese restaurants? Is this dog or “lamb”
By Jennifer 8. Lee | November 2, 2007
The Moscow Times reports the police are investigating a Chinese restaurant for killing dogs and serving them.
A Chinese restaurant in southwest Moscow is being investigated on suspicion of rounding up dogs on the street, killing them and passing their cooked meat off to customers as lamb, city police said Monday.
Two residents went to police after seeing suspicious activity near the restaurant, located at 88 Prospekt Vernadskogo, near the Yugo-Zapadnaya metro station, police spokeswoman Irina Volk said.
“They reported seeing a truck pull up to the restaurant and restaurant employees unloading bags in which something was moving and whining,” Volk said.
After the tip-off, undercover police officers went and posed as clients, ordering a number of dishes from the restaurant, which is located in a dormitory near Moscow State Pedagogical University and caters primarily to Chinese and Vietnamese clientele, as well as local students, Volk said.
“Tests showed that the meat being sold as lamb was actually dog meat,” Volk said.
Most of the dogs were strays, and many were sick, but several of the dogs likely had owners and had merely gotten lost, she said.
My first impulse upon reading it was this has somewhat of an urban legend feel to it (though dog meat is eaten by the Chinese and Koreans), then I hit upon this line, and knew it was probably true.
The dog meat was sold as lamb to most of the restaurant’s clients, but it was advertised as dog to its Chinese clientele, she said.
So if you ever wondered if there really two menus — for Chinese and non-Chinese, the answer is yes.
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It’s like, he showed up in my apartment and wanted to talk about my couch
By Jennifer 8. Lee | October 31, 2007
A few nights ago, I had dinner with my friend Seth, who had a copy of the galley and was reading it. He wasn’t inherently interested in Chinese food a a topic, yet he was drawn in by the book and could see people telling each other to read it (I was trying to figure out if I was flattered or offended by the fact he wasn’t interested in Chinese food but was reading the book).
Then he started talking about the merits of various choices I had made in writing specific sections of the book. It felt disconcerting discussing it with him. Because it wasn’t just like “Oh, I like the book!” which I get a lot. He wanted to dissect it a bit. It took me a while before I could put my finger on it.
For about three years, it has been basically me and this book, just the two of us (Jon Karp jumped in at the end, and he is my editor). But, it’s been a very private relationship and there are personal elements of me strewn throughout this book (as opposed to the newspaper articles I write, which are very arms length). Now suddenly, someone else not involved in the creative process was in our (the book and my)Â space (Seth). It was like he had showed up in my living room or something, and had opinions on my choice of my couch (To be fair, I was crashing at his place, and we spent a lot of time discussing furniture he was planning to buy. Turns out he’s a Crate and Barrel kind of guy, though he really fell for this bed I showed him from Environment Furniture).
It explained my reaction to him. He told me, “Um, I hate to tell you this, but your book is about to be published, to the public.” It seems silly to say this, but that is a really strange thought to me.
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Enthusiastic, unprovoked word of mouth from our sales reps
By Jennifer 8. Lee | October 30, 2007
My editor forwarded me some nice comments from the sales reps, who are now reading the book to gear up to sell to independent bookstores.
As it was explained to me, two things move books: national media and word of mouth. Word of mouth works best when the sales reps get excited, pass that enthusiasm to the booksellers, who then pass that enthusiasm to the readers (a.k.a. normal people) through a process in the industry known as “handselling.”
Word of mouth tends can have amazing effects in paperback fiction, igniting books that never made the hardcover fiction list like The Memory Keeper’s Daughter and The Kite Runner, as noted by Motoko Rich in the New York Times.
Here are three comments from a chat thread…
The Fortune Cookie Chronicles is everything that booksellers enjoy aggressively handselling – fun, informative, and well-written. I’m returning to buyers to discuss increasing their initial buys.
Don’t you love the story about how all those Powerball winners got their statistically anomalous numbers from fortune cookies? I’m really enjoying this book.
I’ve done that, too, used the fortune cookie numbers for Lotto, alas, not that week………..Yes, really great book.
(yay)
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