Tomb Sweeping: Stories
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Compelling and perceptive, Tomb SweepingΒ probes the loyalties we hold: to relatives, to strangers, and to ourselves.Β In stories set across the US and Asia, Alexandra Chang immerses us in the lives of immigrant families, grocery store employees, expecting parents, and guileless lab assistants.
A woman known only to her neighbors as βthe Asian recycling ladyβ collects bottles from the streets she calls home. A young college grad ponders the void left from a broken friendship. An unfulfilled housewife in Shanghai finds a secret outlet for her ambitions in an undercover gambling den. Two strangers become something more through the bond of mistaken identity.
These characters, adeptly attuned to the mystery of living,Β invite us to consider whether it is possible for anyone to entirely do right by another. Tomb SweepingΒ brims with remarkable skill and talent in every story, keeping a definitive pulse on loss, community, and what it means to feel fully alive. With her debut story collection, Chang further establishes herself as βa writer to watchβ (New York Times Book Review).Β
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Alexandra Chang is the author of Days of Distraction. She is a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 honoree, and her writing has appeared in Zoetrope: All-Story, The New York Times, Harperβs Bazaar, Guernica, and elsewhere. She lives in Ventura County.
