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Like the protagonist in her debut novel, The Moon Goddess’s Smile, Catherine Wu spent her formative years in China before coming to New York City as a graduate student. After a biomedical research career and podiatry practice, she followed her heart to pursue her dream of becoming a storyteller. She honed her fiction-writing skills at Boston’s Grubstreet to tell this unique story, a labor of love.
Nowadays, she lives with her husband in Jacksonville, FL. If she isn’t taming the sword ferns and pennyworts in her weedy garden, you will most likely find her in her kitchen, experimenting with impossible flavor combinations or researching her dream family vacation in southern Europe.
Reviewed by K.C. Finn for Readers' Favorite
The Moon Goddess's Smile by Catherine C. Wu tells the tale of a Chinese American biomedical researcher, Mei, who returns to China to fulfill a family duty: transferring her late grandmother's apartment to her male cousin so he can marry. But what should be a simple legal task turns into a bureaucratic nightmare. As she navigates this ordeal, her interracial marriage in Boston begins to unravel. Struggling to balance the expectations of two clashing cultures, she faces a midlife reckoning. Through the journey, Wu explores themes of family loyalty, cultural identity, and the fragility of human connections. Ultimately, this moving novel celebrates resilience, self-discovery, and the enduring power of familial bonds.
Author Catherine C. Wu has a real eye for how a small detail can paint a picture, and this beautifully penned novel captures the complexity of cultural duality with raw honesty and emotional depth down to the finest brush stroke. I was swept away by the world that Wu invites us into as the novel’s rich, atmospheric settings evoke both China’s traditions and Boston’s modernity with wonderful clashes that are educational, but never overdone. I also appreciated Mei as a character thanks to the close narration of her every thought and feeling. This emotional struggle is deeply relatable with common themes about expectations and family pressure that made her journey profoundly moving. These themes come naturally from Mei’s personal experiences. Wu's elegant prose creates a powerful exploration of family, identity, and belonging that leaves you thinking long after you’ve set the book down. Overall, The Moon Goddess's Smile is a gorgeous read that I highly recommend to fans of accomplished cultural dramas.
