WORLD AND TOWN

New lives, new towns, new worlds revolve around the character of Hattie Kong, a retired high school biology teacher who has moved to a New England town. Janet Song performs Gish Jen's absorbing novel with tones that evoke the heroine’s Asian heritage and inner knowledge. Song moves through three vocal sensibilities with precision and clarity—an American accent, an Asian accent, and deftly suggested Asian dialects. After two significant losses, Hattie's new life is enriched by her new Cambodian-American neighbors and by a former lover, a retired neuroscientist. These divergent lives connect as the characters struggle to forge American identities and are touched by Hattie's friendship and local activism. A.W. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine [Published: FEBRUARY 2011]