Reviews

Emily Fridlund, author of the Booker Prize finalist History of Wolves:

“Jack Wang’s dazzling first collection of stories, We Two Alone, moves through decades and across continents with rare ease, telling not the story but some of the many stories of the Chinese diaspora in the last century. These stories are so elegantly shaped, so satisfying as individual stories, that their collective power sneaks up on you. There is a quiet and building intensity to the storytelling here, a commitment to chronicling — with deep compassion and a refusal of easy answers — the dignity of human experience against the broader indignities of history. I was moved, heartbroken, and thrilled.”

Robert Olen Butler, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain:

“Jack Wang’s We Two Alone is not only a penetrating examination of the Chinese diaspora, it also brilliantly renders its subject in the most deeply resonant universal way, as the yearning for personal identity that drives us all in our shared humanity. This is a remarkable collection of stories, a remarkable work of art.”

Sharon Bala, bestselling author of The Boat People:

“One of the best books I’ve read this year and one of my all-time favourite short-story collections."

Alix Ohlin, author of the Scotiabank Giller Prize finalists Dual Citizens and Inside:

“This impressive and vibrant collection of stories takes the reader by the hand, leading us across the world and back in time. But they’re all unified by the gentle sensitivity of Jack Wang’s prose and his ability to inhabit characters who long for freedom, connection, and fulfillment. Deeply humane and beautifully wrought, these stories stay in the heart and the mind.”

Viet Thanh Nguyen, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Sympathizer:

“These moving stories are both global and intimate as they span the continents where the Chinese diaspora has settled. With ingenuity and impeccable craft, Jack Wang gives us an utterly remarkable collection that zeroes in on the emotional texture of utterly unique lives.”

Danuta Gleed Literary Award Jury Citation:

“In We Two Alone, Jack Wang has written an instantly engaging and achingly poignant collection of stories about people struggling to preserve their way of life and seeking stability, connection, and meaning. Focusing on Chinese immigrant experiences, Wang’s stories range freely and easily across many decades and a dizzyingly assortment of geographies. All of Wang’s characters are vividly rendered, their struggles and agonies richly conceived and indelibly portrayed. The writing throughout is atmospheric, highly visual, and peppered with startling and persuasive detail. Long after finishing it, We Two Alone lingers in the mind as a compassionate work by a profoundly talented writer who cares deeply about what it means to be human in turbulent times.”

Literary Review of Canada:

“A collection that announces an important new voice in contemporary fiction … Beyond Vancouver, Shanghai, Vienna, Port Elizabeth, and London, the stories in We Two Alone encompass Tallahassee, Los Angeles, and Boston. Wang is committed to rendering his backdrops accurately; with perfectly presented details, he showcases the disharmony of the Chinese diaspora, as individuals endure salient moments in twentieth-century history and more recent times … We Two Alone shows that Jack Wang is a master of the short story, a writer who has mapped his own space, neither Canadian nor American, nor anywhere else. Each episode in this collection is a moving tribute to its characters as well as an indictment of the ostracism that remains when racist taunts and human failures continue to bedevil the modern world.”

Winnipeg Free Press:

“Rich and poignant … History lovers and literary buffs will sink joyfully into his moving collection … Wang manages to underscore the importance of cultural heritage while stressing humanity’s common ties … His ability to create vivid and believable settings, in beautiful and readable prose, will deeply move readers.”

Ormsby Review:

“Jack Wang is a welcome new voice in Canadian letters … [We Two Alone] is serious, engaging, well crafted, thought-provoking. Wang clearly has something to say, and this accomplished collection not only says it but also promises a great deal more to come.”

Publishers Weekly:

"Wang's elegant debut delves into the heterogeneity of the Chinese diaspora in stories that take the reader to settings as disparate as 1920s Canada and Nazi-occupied Vienna....Wang's prose is subtle and economical, well suited to his themes of disappointment, alienation, and departure. As the stories build on one another, they create a portrait full of both nuance and grace."

New York Journal of Books:

"Wang has the distinct skill of evoking time and place, many eras, many places, and putting his characters, and the reader in them. For this, for his erudition, for his poetic prose, readers of short fiction should search out any short story he writes.

Shelf Awareness-starred:

"The seven impeccable stories in Jack Wang's excellent debut collection feature a diasporic Chinese cast over decades and across continents....Wang writes with masterful assurance, eschewing labels, and creating exquisite gems of universal empathy."