It was a awesome book! I had to read it for English, it was awesome!!!! ( )

Tan's glorious novel portrays the complex relationships between four mothers (all Chinese immigrants) and their American-born daughters. Each of the mothers came to America as young women who had survived tragedy in their native China. In their efforts to create better lives for their daughters, they created many misunderstandings as well. The daughters struggle for independence, but also long for their mothers' love and understanding.

The novel is complex, especially since there are so many major characters. However, it is well worth the effort to keep everyone straight. This novel doesn't only speak to the experience of immigrants; mothers and daughters everywhere should read this book.

Highly recommended! ( )

This is my least favorite Amy Tan book so far. Though the beginning of the book linked the mothers and their daughters through the Joy Luck Club, it seemed that the stories were not even connected to each other through most of the book. I had to keep referring back to the beginning to see whose daughter or whose mother was telling each story. The stories themselves were not bad, but it was almost like reading a book of short stories for me instead of reading stories that were connected as part of a longer book. I'm not a fan of short stories, so the format of this book made it much less interesting to me. ( )

I am the mother of two teenage girls. I am also a daughter. This means that the whole mother-daughter relationship is one that I have given a lot of thought and energy. Being where I am in my life, I read The Joy Luck Club with a very different perspective from the time I first read it.

Jing-Mei Woo learns that her mother had a family before the one she has now, complete with a soldier husband and twin baby girls. With the war in China bringing such danger and uncertainty, her mother takes her babies and flees into the countryside. But her strength begins to fail and she makes the difficult decision to leave the girls, along with everything she owns, and hopes that someone will find them and take care of them.

But life doesn't work the way she expected. She survives. For years, she knows nothing about the fate of her daughters. She remarries and has another baby daughter. Then she learns that her twins have survived. She tries to contact them, she plans a visit. But she dies before she can make that trip.

All of this takes place early in the book. The rest of the book focuses on lives of 8 women, mothers and daughters. The mothers have lives and stories to tell that their daughters have never heard.

I enjoyed this book, if it was not quite so emotional for me as it was the first time I read it. Instead it just reminded me of how complicated this relationship is and how much I need to work on it. ( )

This is both a moving story about the relationships between Mothers and Daughters and also a tale of just how much a heritage can shape who and what you are. Amy Tan's writing is very fluid and though the narrative moves between 4 different sets of mothers and daughters she never loses you. ( )

I fell in love with this book the minute I started reading it. Tan has such a talent not only for depicting mother/daughter relationships, but also for making Asian and Asian-American culture accessible to those not part of it. ( )

I loved this book. It was so beautifully written. All of the stories tied together wonderfully. I liked how each story could also be read seperately also and no other context was needed. Usually I am not a huge short story fan, but this was just fantastic. In my copy of the book it has a chart listing the mothers and the daughters and that helped tie everything together for me. I also loved how the first story and the last story just tied the whole book together in such a wonderful way. ( )

The Joy Luck Club was a group of Chinese women that immigrated to the United States. They met to play Mahjong and share stories. They are proud of their American daughters, yet they continually try to instill their Chinese culture in them. The daughters grow up struggling to please their mothers...while becoming "their own person." Each character's story is cruical to the whole book; though they have different circumstances, they relate to each other with a bond tied to Chinese roots.
Jing-mei,"June", daughter of Suyuan seems to carry the novel as her mother has died and she is called upon to fill her seat when the ladies gather for their Mahjong games. The luck of the group has finally been realized, and Suyuan's friends are anxious to share joyous news with June. It seems that Suyuan had to leave twin daughters behind years ago when fleeing the country, while China was under attack from Japan. June grew up believing that her sisters had died, but learns now that they are still alive. June's sisters have written and are anxious to meet their birth mother.
The ending is bittersweet, as the sisters meet... June sees expressions and gestures that uncannily remind her of her mother. She realizes now she wants to know everything she can about her mother. Like her sisters who never knew their mother,in a way, she feels the same ....like she missed so much.

The daughters realize how the Mahjong stories are important. I predict they are meant to be passed on to future generations. ( )

A beautiful memory of the prices one pays to be a Chinese woman. Though the seven different stories switch place and time easily, the major themes of family, duty, inheritance and femininity beat a strong current throughout. Some of the main characters can be detestable, but there is also a sense of familiarity found in each one. This book is sad and full of regret, but inspires is a small way. I personally enjoyed the many tales about places I had experienced in my own way, and loved seeing them in a different light. ( )

Slow, but infused with much magic, mystery, and myth.

There is much to be learned from the relationships between the characters--the obvious generational disconnect and the subtle, almost invisible commonalities. The relationships and interactions between the characters, and what they desire from each other and expect from each other, is what makes this one of my favorite books. The end is amazing, and Jing-Mei Woo remains one of my favorite literary characters ever. ( )

This story is about four mothers and daughters. The mothers were born and raised in China and somehow ended up in America. Their daughters are born and raised in America. This book tells the story of all eight people. All stories are different, but they also are related. An interesting read about surviving in a new society.

http://boekenwijs.blogspot.com/2009/0... ( )

I'm not sure if it was because this was abridged or because I was trying to multi-task as I listened to it (likely, a combination of the two), but I found my mind wandering during this & I just didn't get as much out of it as I'd expected. Perhaps one day I'll read the whole thing & gain a greater appreciation. ( )

http://amiralace.blogspot.com/2009/01... ( )

I love the fluidity of the book, Amy Tan writes so eloquently that it is a pleasure to read every word. I wish I found the structure more logical. I understand the reasons the author put the chapters in the order they went; but I found it difficult to keep track of which mother and which daughter were speaking. ( )

very good book, follows a group of oriental women and how their American lives differed from their Chinese mothers ( )

Wonderful book of mothers, daughters, and cultural mythology. Tan has a terrific ear for dialogue. Up there with Timothy Mo in this storytelling niche. ( )

There is no real main character in this story all the characters (and their stories) are equally important and equally engaging. While the book was not a page turner, I did care what happen to all the characters. It was very intriguing to know how all the mothers came to America and how their experiences shaped how the raised each of their perspective daughters. For the daughters it was more interesting to watch them try to navigate being Chinese and American. I did not get the feeling in the book that the mothers ever wanted to fit into American culture and that they did not really what their children to either. They wanted them to have Chinese values with American opportunity. While the daughters just wanted to be Chinese.

At times I felt myself siding with the daughters because to me it seemed that the mothers had no understanding of who their daughters were. It appeared that the mothers just wanted them to be obey all their wishing, sacrificing their own. I don't know if Tan did this on purpose but I is kind of confusing. Because some of the mothers hardship seems to come from just obeying and not thinking. And these women (the mothers) than expect their daughters to do the same thing.

What I really like about this book was the style that it was written in sometimes it was like reading a fairy tale (almost "Like Water for Chocolate") but more realistic. The imaginary was beautiful and caught my imagination quickly. I kept having this thought that I would love to see this as a foreign film where the whole thing has to be translated. I know that there is a movie, I even saw it years ago. But I don't remember the movie being as vivid as the book.

Another positive with this book is that with the daughters Tan was able to portray the idea of what it is like to grow up as a second generation immigrant. In this case not quite American but not quite Chinese. The daughters have to struggle with what their mother are trying to teach them about being Chinese, which often comes out like riddles, and what they think the should know about being American. The mothers and daughters struggle with this battle between being Chinese and being American. Almost like they can't do both.

One of the negatives I had was that the mothers sometimes came for as stereotypes. I think this is sometimes a problem when people of color try to write books that not only speak to their experience and culture but will also appeal to a wider audience.

Pros: Imagery, Characters, Stories, Internal Conflict
Cons: Stereotype Like Characters ( )

Since reading this book, I've always meant to read something else by Amy Tan, but never have. The Joy Luck Club is a fantastic book; it's well- and interestingly-written, and I like that all of the main characters get their chance to narrate. ( )

A touching yet complex novel about the mysterious distance between a mother and daughter, each from different worlds. Absorbing and sorrowfully brief, it cast a spell on me. Moving but never maudlin, dramatic without being depressing. Definitely an essential novel for anyone who has ever struggled and failed to understand the woman who gave her birth. ( )

Touching, funny, moving...beautiful stories of what it's like to be an immigrant, mother-daughter relationships ( )

My mom insisted I read The Joy Luck Club, but it was only after I saw it on the AP Lit reading list that I decided to concede to my mother’s request. And I’m glad I did because The Joy Luck Club is a beautifully written book that’s insightful without coming across as overly academic and stuffy.

“And even though I taught my daughter the opposite, still she came out the same way! Maybe it is because she was born to me and she born a girl. And I was born to my mother and I was born a girl. All of sue are like stairs, one step after another, going up and down, but all going the same way.” {pg. 215}

Amy Tan’s writing style really drawls you in and she does a fantastic job of establishing voices for all eight characters, no easily feat I’m sure. True, twice I had to check the name to make sure I was connecting the right mother and daughter, but each character is clearly their own person with their own experiences and struggles.

“And I want to tell her this: We are lost, she and I, unseen and not seeing, unheard and not hearing, unknown by others.” {pg. 67}

Obviously, based on the back cover blurb, The Joy Luck Club is about mother-daughter relationships. But despite being completely rooted in Chinese culture, I could still understand what Tan was trying to explain through each of the mother’s relationships with their respective daughters.

“But inside I am becoming ashamed. I am ashamed she is ashamed. Because she is my daughter and I am proud of her, and I am her mother but she I not proud of me.” {pg. 255}

Still, some of women’s stories bored me and a couple frustrated me with their “do as I say, not as I do” attitudes. I realize that this is a somewhat common philosophy among mothers {Err, not you, Mom}, but I couldn’t help but to yell at these women for criticizing their own daughters as they chose their own courses, when some of them did the exact same thing in China. ( )

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan is the story of a young woman dealing with the death of her mother and learning about her mother and other female family member's past. It is a series of stories about growing up in China and America. The main character learns about her mother and is able to come to terms with the things she never understood about her mother.

I read this book in my Women in Literature class. When I read it I felt that it would be a wonderful book for young women to read.

In the class room this would be a good book for learning about Chinese culture and modern-day female authors.

A stunning literary achievement, The Joy Luck Club explores the tender and tenacious bond between four daughters and their mothers. The daughters know one side of their mothers, but they don't know about their earlier never-spoken of lives in China. The mothers want love and obedience from their daughters, but they don't know the gifts that the daughters keep to themselves. Heartwarming and bittersweet, this is a novel for mother, daughters, and those that love them

Having read and thoroughly enjoyed Tan’s The Bonesetter’s Daughter a number of years ago, I was looking forward to Tan’s first book. While I can see why it is often studied on college campuses, I found it less enjoyable. I think it was the structure of the novel. The seven narrators, six of whom tell two stories each and one (June) who tells four (her dead mother’s stories and her own), were sometimes hard to follow. I think I would have preferred each mother-daughter pair’s of stories more in sequence, as it was difficult at times to tell who was who.

The mothers’ stories were more intriguing (and heartbreaking), reflecting their early lives in China in times of great upheaval in the 1940s, before emigrating around 1949. Nearly forty years later, their American-born daughters are in their late 20s and early 30s, going through career and man problems in San Francisco, the most interesting aspect of their stories being the cultural clash in their relationships with their mothers.

This collection of short stories reflects the author’s real life, for like June’s mother Suyuan Woo, Tan’s mother also fled China leaving children from her first marriage behind. Tan’s grandmother had a son taken from her and eventually committed suicide, as An-mei Hsu’s mother did. Tan’s mother had high expectations of her (she wanted her to be a neurosurgeon by profession with the "hobby" of concert pianist), and their relationship was rocky. This last, the uneasy mother-daughter relationships but ultimate mother-daughter love, gives The Joy Luck Club its universality. ( )

I loved how this book was written in different points of view.It was like a whole heap of short stories that were connected in some way or another I highly recomend this book=] ( )