I was keen to read "Interior Chinatown" by Charles Yu after hearing good things about it, and I wasn't disappointed. The novel's title perfectly encapsulates the theme. The author uses a screenplay format to explore the stereotyping of Asian-Americans in the media, and by extension, in American society in general. As a bit actor in a cop buddy series "Black and White", the protagonist, Willis Wu, finds himself excluded from both the white majority and black minority experience, and relegated to "generic Asian man". The full eventual assimilation into "generic American man" seems out of reach as he first struggles to achieve success as "Kung-Fu man", which eludes him. The novel is very funny, and also thought-provoking as it examines the psychological effect of this social stereotyping - hence "interior Chinatown", that psychological condition that reflects the physical ghetto of exclusion Asians have been relegated to despite two centuries of presence in America.
For a review of the book from the Washington Post, click here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/charles-yus-interior-chinatown-brilliantly-skewers-hollywood-typecasting/2020/01/27/4d04be48-3711-11ea-bf30-ad313e4ec754_story.html
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