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Writer Leonard Chang | noir thrillers with a twist
"Picture this: You are a 9-year-old listening to your parents scream at each other in Korean, their words incomprehensible because you don't understand the language, but the savagery of their intent is clear enough. You don't want to leave your bedroom because you will draw attention to yourself, so the only thing you can do is sit and wait. You have dozens of books on your shelf. Your favorite: Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators series...solving crimes you wish you could solve. You find yourself enthralled by their adventures. You wish you could, like them, fix a world that has gone awry..." (read).
So explains how LEONARD CHANG became a writer of crime fiction. The Harvard-educated writer's work is unusual in Asian American literature because of the level of assimilation many of his Korean American characters have achieved. They tend to be 2nd or 3rd generation Americans, often with few ties to their ethnic origins. His later works deal less with race relations than with character-driven issues, such as with his character Allen Choice, whose name ("Choice" changed from the Korean "Choi" by his father) denotes the shift in ethnic identity and themes.
Over the Shoulder, the first of 3 mystery/noir novels featuring Korean American protoganist Allen Choice, has been optioned by Daniel Dae Kim of Lost producing (and possibly starring as Allen Choice) in a film version.
MORE:
* Leonard Chang
* More about Chang's writing:
"Chang's experiments in genre fiction is related to this shift, since the stories revolve around solving a mystery or crime, and despite the fact that the protagonist is Korean American, the debt here is more to Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, and Ross Macdonald than to Maxine Hong Kingston, Amy Tan or Richard E. Kim.
Still in the early stages of his career, Chang's work is constantly maturing and developing, and what seems to differentiate his work from others of his generation is his singular focus on detailing the Korean American experience as distinctly American."
* His official website offers Leonard's bio, novel descriptions, news, interviews and essays:
www.leonardchang.com.
* Leonard Chang is featured in article in SF Gate:
"Not 'the next Amy Tan': Korean American writers find their own voices in genre fiction" by Annie Nakao, Chronicle Staff Writer, Sunday, August 1, 2004:
* Leonard Chang's "Over the Shoulder" cover
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Posted by TamikoMarch 21, 2007 at 12:41 AM
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