The Pearl Pavilion
Photo by Hikarinoshita Hikari on Unsplash Vanessa Hua’s latest novel, Forbidden City, is the story of an ambitious, savvy teenage girl and her rise to power alongside the leader of China’s cultural revolution. Initially, the novel had dual timelines: one in 1960s China and the other in 1970s San Francisco Chinatown. Eventually, Hua cut most of the Chinatown timeline, except for what appears in the prologue and epilogue of the finished novel. This is an excerpt from the parallel timeline that Hua removed.
In her journalism and in her fiction, Hua has written about Asia and the diaspora for more than two decades. Her first novel, A River of Stars, which Guernica excerpted, is set in contemporary Chinatown.
— Jina Moore for Guernica
he Cook is plating another tiny portion, his head bent, and I am grateful he doesn’t see me upset. Grateful for all that he has done for me tonight and many nights at the Pearl Pavilion. I yearn to tell
