CRAZY RICH ASIANS - Book

Crazy Rich Asians, Kevin Kwan

THE BOOK

Crazy Rich Asians was released in 2013 and soon became an acclaimed bestseller.

The story starts as a couple trip to Singapore, where Nick plans to introduce his girlfriend Rachel to friends and family.

All easy and clear, you'd think. But no! I'd say, as all the good Chinese books I have read in many years, the harsh drama is just around the corner.

Rachel was raised in California by her Asian single mother. She's a professor of Economics at the New York University NYU and lives a middle class life.

Her boyfriend Nick, a NYU professor of History, was raised in Singapore. That's all we know. That's all Rachel knows!

What Nick has subtly forgotten to tell Rachel is that he's the main heir of a beyond-wealthy empire in Singapore. And, obviously, his family has expectations and programs for his life, including marriage plans, in which Rachel has really no place to be.

I am not going to spoiler more. The entire story is basically a revival of Cinderella. But a good one. I can simply say that the characters are very well built at the point that I couldn't literally stand several of them, for their unkind or spoiled behaviors. The scenography is totally convincing, as plenty of the places can be easily traced and found on the map. And, more especially, everything rotates about a true crazy rich life level that none of us, middle class and below people, could never even imagine about. How do I know it? Well, life is funny and gave me chance of being slightly exposed to this types of Singaporean lavish families, enough to confirm that all that happens in the book has got a realistic background and a great chance of being a real life story.

THE AUTHOR

Kevin Kwan was born in Singapore, amid a well established Chinese Singaporean family. At 11 yeas old, his family brought him to Texas, where he graduated in Media Studies. He then moved to New York to attend to the Parsons School of Design and started working for publicists and magazines.

"The legend says" that he started writing "Crazy Rich Asians" while taking care of his hill father, when the 2 kept remembering pieces of their lives in Singapore, filtering them thru their more westernized points of view.

In 2014, he was named as one of the "Five Writers to Watch" by The Hollywood Reporter, and in 2018, he was in Time magazine's list of 100 most influential people.

WHAT'S NEXT

Kevin Kwan built up a trilogy, adding to "Crazy Rich Asians" 2 other titles: "ChinaRich Girlfriend" and "Rich People Problems".

I haven't read any of the 2, as I needed to give myself some long time to accept and digest Nick and Rachel's story. I think that, after 2 years from reading he 1st book, I might be ready to go ahead. All of this says that his book was well written, I was so involved in the story that I had to take some distance from these guys for a while, ahahahah!!

Imagine that, for the same reason, I couldn't watch the movie until just few months ago! Yep, a movie was made from the book, and was released in 2018. More about it in the Movies' section!

More at the official author's page https://www.kevinkwanbooks.com/