AT
Meet the Author
Amy Tan
American · born 1952 · Novelist
The author of The Joy Luck Club, whose stories of Chinese American mothers and daughters reached millions of readers.
1 StoryBites Edition1 Short story
Why read Amy Tan?
Tan writes about the gap between immigrant parents and their American-born children: the expectations, the misunderstandings, and the love underneath. Her stories are funny, painful, and often told from both sides. Read her to understand how family history shapes who we become.
A life in six dates
- 1952Born in Oakland, California, to Chinese immigrant parents
- 1989The Joy Luck Club
- 1991The Kitchen God’s Wife
- 1993The Joy Luck Club film released
- 2001The Bonesetter’s Daughter
Themes across the work
The StoryBites Editions
Context that actually matters
Immigrant familiesHer fiction draws on the experience of parents who left China and children raised in America.
Mothers and daughtersThe relationship between generations of women is at the center of her best-known work.
Linked storiesThe Joy Luck Club is built from connected stories told by four mothers and four daughters.