River East, River West: A Novel

by Aube Rey Lescure

Overview

SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE

“Smart, confident storytelling. . . has perceptive things to say about the explosion of wealth in China and the fraught, totemic influence Americans have on the nation’s psyche.” — Wall Street Journal

Part mesmerizing coming-of-age tale, part intimate family drama, this stunning debut novel follows a young woman searching for belonging and opportunity in a rapidly changing world.

Shanghai, 2007: Feeling betrayed by her American mother’s engagement to their rich landlord Lu Fang, teenager Alva begins plotting her escape. But the exclusive American School—a potential ticket out—is not what she imagined, and she’s surprised to discover an institution run by an exclusive community of expats, and the ever-wilder thrills of a city where foreigners can ostensibly act as they please.

Qingdao, 1985: Newlywed Lu Fang works as a lowly shipping clerk. Though he aspires to a bright future, he is one of many casualties of harsh political reforms. Then China opens up to foreigners and capital, and Lu Fang meets a woman who makes him question what he should settle for.

Seamlessly alternating between these two points of view, River East, River West explores complex questions of identity as Alva comes of age: Is she a local or a foreigner? Who is this man her mother married, and can he be a father when she never had one? A powerful reversal of the east-to-west immigrant narrative set against China’s economic rise, this lauded debut novel is a profoundly moving portrait of girlhood, race, and class, cultural identity and belonging, as it is the seductive allure of the American Dream.

“Delicately nuanced, devilishly propulsive, and achingly human, this is a coming-of-age story like no other.” —Oprah Daily

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780063257863
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	01/21/2025
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	5.31(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.79(d)

About the Author

Aube Rey Lescure is a French-Chinese-American writer who grew up between Shanghai, northern China, and the south of France. After receiving her B.A. from Yale University, she worked in foreign policy and has co-authored and translated two books on Chinese politics and economics. She was the 2019 Ivan Gold Fellow at the Writers’ Room of Boston, a Pauline Scheer Fellow at GrubStreet, a finalist for the 2018 Boston Public Library Writer-in-Residence program, and an artist-in-residence at the Studios of Key West and Willapa Bay AiR. Her fiction and creative nonfiction have appeared in Guernica, Best American Essays, The Florida Review online, WBUR, and more.

Editorial Reviews

★ 11/13/2023

Rey Lescure’s captivating and sharp debut explores the dreams of an angsty mixed-race Chinese teen in Shanghai and her new stepfather, an older Chinese businessman. The story opens in 2007 with 14-year-old Alva fuming at the lavish wedding of her 40-something American mother, Sloan, upset that the nearly 60-year-old Lu Fang has “stole” Sloan from her. In Alva’s eyes, Lu Fang is just the latest in a line of men who have financed Alva’s and Sloan’s lives in China, though he’s the first one to marry Sloan. Alva has never known her Chinese father, and has only ever wanted to move to America, but Sloan, a former Hollywood movie star, sees no point in returning, prompting Alva to act out by drinking and sending hentai porn to her classmates. Alva’s story is seamlessly interspersed with Lu Fang’s perspective, beginning in 1985 in the northern Chinese city of Qingdao, where he first met Sloan. At 36, he swims in the ocean each day to dull the sorrows of having been denied college graduation years earlier and his impending fatherhood with a wife he does not love. When he is approached by the beautiful blonde Sloan, who asks him to teach her to swim, he falls deeply for the confident and forthcoming young woman. They begin a passionate, risky affair. This glimpse into Lu Fang’s early life adds depth to a character who, in 2007, Alva only sees as an ATM. Rey Lescure provides immersive depictions of Shanghai and Qingdao along with delicate character work. This is a remarkable story of a family caught between cultures. Agent: Hillary Jacobson, CAA. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

Smart, confident storytelling. . . has perceptive things to say about the explosion of wealth in China and the fraught, totemic influence Americans have on the nation’s psyche.” — Wall Street Journal

“I loved River East, River West, which portrays western expats in Shanghai with both clear-eyed critique and compassion.” — R. F. Kuang, The Guardian 

“In River East, River West, Rey Lescure proves herself to be a remarkably humane storyteller, focusing on the ties between her characters and the worlds they inhabit in order to ground an ambitious, multi-generational story of global upheaval in personal, poignant detail.” — Boston Globe

"In Aube Rey Lescure’s beautiful debut novel, familiar narratives of adolescence are scrambled across lines of class, race, and national difference. As her characters deepen with each chapter, she makes us feel the inexhaustible mystery of other lives. A moving portrait of the love between a mother and daughter, River East, River West portrays, too, our powerlessness against the riptides of history.”  — Garth Greenwell, author of Cleanness

“Captivating and sharp. . . Rey Lescure provides immersive depictions of Shanghai and Qingdao along with delicate character work. This is a remarkable story of a family caught between cultures.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“An intergenerational epic . . . Rey Lescure’s book is a kind of bildungsroman of country and culture. It’s equally a haunting, a novel whose characters carry the specters of promise, often unfulfilled—of youth, of status, of wealth, and of a certain rosy view of American cultural power and opportunity.” — Guernica magazine

“Delicately nuanced, devilishly propulsive, and achingly human, this is a coming-of-age story like no other.” — Oprah Daily

“Immersive. . . At once autobiographical fiction and historical fiction, a Shanghai novel and a novel of the American dream, and a story in which families and countries fall apart, but also have a chance at fresh starts. Rey Lescure’s prose is cinematic, compelling, perceptive and poignant.” — The Guardian

"Brilliantly captures a young woman's coming-of-age story as she and her American expat mother navigate a world of social intrigue in modern-day China. The novel incisively asks questions about ambition, class, and legacy, while retaining unfailing compassion for its characters.” — TODAY, Thao Thai, author of Banyan Moon

“This reverse-immigration story is both an intimate, poignant family drama and a sweeping, expansive chronicle of China’s political history. . . River East, River West is a perfect pick for book clubs and fans of Susie Yang's White Ivy and Lisa Ko's The Leavers.” — Bookreporter.com

“Rey Lescure’s brilliant debut alternates between the lives of Lu Fang and Alva, placing their desires and evolving story lines in a vibrant social context. . . With an assured hand, Rey Lescure illuminates how even someone who feels trapped and diminished can still make a life.” — Booklist (starred review)

“River East, River West is a searing and intimate exploration of both China and the American Dream. Poignant and propulsive, thoughtful, and moving. I loved this book.” — Jean Kwok, New York Times bestselling author of Searching for Sylvie Lee

"River East, River West is a beautifully expansive tale of new beginnings—and the pasts we can't extricate ourselves from. From Qingdao to Shanghai, readers are invited into a richly layered world teeming with secrets, desires, and unexpected tenderness. Bright human insights shine through unforgettable characters fighting for their autonomy, often straining against familial bonds for a glimpse of freedom. In this exciting literary debut, Aube Rey Lescure deftly illuminates the difficult choices we make to save ourselves and each other." — Thao Thai, author of Banyan Moon

"River East, River West is a keen exploration of love, heritage, and the search for home, told through alternating points of view—rebellious Alva and her stepfather Lu Fang with secrets of his own. Aube Rey Lescure’s portrayal of the glitter and grit of China’s tumultuous economic rise is by turns luminous and searing. A haunting debut." — Vanessa Hua, author of Forbidden City

"At once tender and unflinching, River East, River West is a staggering, immersive coming-of-age set irresistibly amid the glamour and grime of a changing Shanghai. Aube Rey Lescure has crafted a vast, yet intimate, novel about performance and belonging, power and identity, that never loses focus on the fierce and broken hearts at its center—the magnetic repulsion and attraction of family splitting and reshaping. An extraordinary, riveting debut—I loved every word." — Katie Gutierrez, author of More Than You'll Ever Know

"A compelling and thought-provoking coming-of-age story about identity and the narratives we create about ourselves. It's a vivid portrait of China and the uneasy relationships of class and family history." — Catherine Cho, author of Inferno: A Memoir of Motherhood and Madness

‘“River east, river west” comes from a famous Chinese saying, which suggests that the world or people’s destiny are always in constant change, and there is no fixed path of rise, fall, honour, or disgrace. Aube Rey Lescure has represented this idea brilliantly in her novel." — Xinran, author of The Good Women of China and Sky Burial

From the Publisher

2023-10-07
In this debut novel set in China, two generations struggle with the consequences of ambition and the difficult search for belonging.

In 2007, Alva is 14 and living in Shanghai, the daughter of a white American mother and a Chinese father she never knew. In 1985, Lu Fang is a young adult in the port city of Qingdao. Weaving between the perspectives of these two characters, the novel is a complex and moving exploration of race, class, gender, and family. Alva struggles to find her way in the world after her mother marries Lu Fang, now their rich landlord. She occupies herself with “wimpy mutinies” both at home and at school while scheming to enter the Shanghai American School, whose glossy advertisements are filled with smiling multiracial children and tidy grounds. When she meets Zoey, a “proper American teenager,” she feels irresistibly drawn to her new friend's family, with their live-in maid and summers in the Hamptons. They seem like the family she’s always wanted, but her relationship with them risks exposing the shadows of their life—and perhaps of the American Dream itself. Back in the '80s, Lu Fang is struggling to make sense of his own life as a shipyard clerk with a pregnant wife, having suffered the loss of his boyhood dream of becoming an international businessman. One day while swimming, he meets a golden-haired American woman who inspires him to reevaluate his life—the consequences of which will reverberate for years to come. Following the economic and cultural undulations of 1980s China and the precursors of what will eventually become the Great Recession, this novel examines the price people must pay when financial—and personal—debts come due.

An ambitious, innovative take on both the immigrant and coming-of-age novel.

Kirkus Reviews