The Kitchen God's Wife
Amy Tan, 1991
★ 4.04 from 90.7k ratings on Goodreads
Historical fiction Literary fiction
A mother's long-guarded past surfaces in the stories she finally tells her daughter, changing how both see the family. A warm, witty voice carries a family story through tenderness and wonder, with stretches that turn painful and raw.
Feels like tenderness, wonder and joy. About family and friendship.
Who it’s for
You may like it if you enjoy mother-daughter stories that mix humor with hard family history and a friendship that holds. Be aware that the account of abuse is harrowing, and some readers found that painful history too bleak or melodramatic.
Why read it
It shows how a hidden past can reshape a family, and it gives you the mother's resilience and friendship without easy comfort.
A page from the book
What kindness can cost the person who is already bracing for the worst.
Of course, Mary was only trying to be kind. I admit that it was more my fault that our friendship became strained. I never told her directly how much her gestures of sympathy offended me. So of course she couldn’t have known that I did not need someone to comfort me. I did not want to be coddled by casseroles. Kindness was compensation. Kindness was a reminder that my life had changed, was always changing, that people thought I should just accept all this and become strong or brave, more enlightened, more peaceful. I wanted nothing to do with that. Instead, I wanted to live my life with the same focus as most people—to worry about my children’s education, but not whether I would be around to see them graduate, to rejoice that I had lost five pounds, and not be fearful that my muscle mass was eroding away. What readers say
Readers found the mother-daughter story moving and the account of abuse harrowing; many were saddened and angered, while some felt the painful history was too bleak or melodramatic. Others valued the protagonist’s resilience and the central friendship.
Amy Tan.Amy Tan learned as an adult that her mother had survived an earlier, abusive marriage in China; that hidden history helped inspire this novel.
Books that feel like this
More by Amy Tan
The Joy Luck Club
Amy Tan, 1989
Four mothers, four daughters and a mahjong table, where immigrant hopes land on American-born children who cannot quite hear them.
Where to get it
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Questions readers ask
- Is The Kitchen God's Wife for me?
- You may like it if you enjoy mother-daughter stories that mix humor with hard family history and a friendship that holds. Be aware that the account of abuse is harrowing, and some readers found that painful history too bleak or melodramatic.
- What is The Kitchen God's Wife like?
- A warm, witty voice carries a family story through tenderness and wonder, with stretches that turn painful and raw. Feels like tenderness, wonder and joy. About family and friendship.
- What should I read after The Kitchen God's Wife?
- If you liked The Kitchen God's Wife, try Mansfield Park (Jane Austen), To All the Boys I've Loved Before (Jenny Han) and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (Lisa See).
A taste of the feed
The sister who decides things cleanly, and the one who can’t.
I wave a spoonful of cookie dough under Margot’s nose, and she hesitates and then opens her mouth. I feed it to her like a baby. “Wait and see, you and Josh will be back together in a day, maybe two.” But even as I’m saying it, I know it’s not true. Margot’s not the kind of girl to break up and get back together on a whim; once she’s decided something, that’s it. There’s no waffling, no regrets. It’s like she said: when she’s done, she’s just done.
To All the Boys I've Loved Before · Jenny Han
The friend everyone counts on, and what it costs to share him.
That’s Douglas. I count on him for everything. If I was stranded on a desert island and could only take one thing, it’d be Douglas. We can share him if you want.
Where the Wild Things Are · Maurice Sendak
The wish is not to be beautiful, only to be unnoticed.
If I found a magic lamp and I could have one wish, I would wish that I had a normal face that no one ever noticed at all. I would wish that I could walk down the street without people seeing me and then doing that look-away thing. Here’s what I think: the only reason I’m not ordinary is that no one else sees me that way.
Wonder · R.J. Palacio
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