American Born Chinese (2006)

The Monkey King as a parable about wanting to be someone else.

Monkey's whole problem is that he refuses to be what he is — which makes him the sharpest possible metaphor for a kid trying to pass.

You want the smartest thing anyone has done with this material in English, and you have an afternoon.

What it keeps and what it changes

Keeps: the theology, seriously. The Monkey King’s punishment under the mountain, and what releases him, is the book’s actual argument.
Changes: the frame. Three braided stories, only one of them mythological, and the way they turn out to be one story is the whole trick.

Whose story is it?

Jin Wang’s, with the Monkey King as the older, angrier version of the same refusal.

How much time does it ask?

A graphic novel — one sitting, and then a second one to check how it was done.

First Second, and the book that won the Printz.

Where to find it

Buy the paperback — Bookshop.org →

Other ways to get it: Paperback — Amazon ↗ · Kindle — Amazon ↗

Borrow it free: Borrow on Libby ↗ · Find at your library — WorldCat ↗

Not sure this is yours? Take the quiz →

More ways west: The Anthony C. Yu Translation, revised (2012) · Julia Lovell’s Monkey King (2021) · Arthur Waley’s Monkey (Grove Press, 1958)