'Sometimes Joan wished there was a place she could visit to feel less alone: a restaurant with very friendly servers, perhaps , where she might order a bowl of spaghetti and casually surrender her insecurities . When she was little, she used to daydream of a place she named in her head the Satisfaction Café, which had friendly employees and nice food and pretty toys; even as a child, Joan’s imagination had not stretched to fantastic outcomes but, rather, a reasonable amount of happiness.'

The Satisfaction Café follows Joan as she settles down in California, through her difficulties in the first few years including a divorce, to her life as a rich white older man's wife, slowly moulding her life around her children and her house, until she starts creating something new based on a childhood wish.

'Yes, Joan was fortunate. But she knew this only meant danger, because eventually good luck turned to bad. And really, there was so much to go wrong in a life: you could cross the street and be hit by a car; a random bubble might travel into your brain and then, well, you needn’t worry about anything anymore.'

The slow plot focuses on Joan's introspection more than even her misfortunes, finding her feet again after the death of her husband and her house burning down, and throwing herself into raising her children. The character sketch of Joan is very well done, showing incredible fortitude and a sense of practicality through her troubles, but more importantly in how she goes against this inertia to create something new - opening The Satisfaction Café in her later years.

More than just a simple café serving coffee and pastries, Joan builds around a beautiful concept, simple yet not easy to create - an ambience of contentment and conversation. Kathy Wang does a brilliant job in weaving the beautiful premise, Joan's practical character arc and her stately writing to tell this story.

'Youth didn’t understand, however, how much luck played into it, that loneliness wasn’t always a choice. Whereas at Joan’s age, you knew it was always somewhere ahead, waiting. It could happen to anyone.'

The secondary characters are all also quite vivid, some a little too vivid and caricatures of the rich and privileged. While most of Joan's reactions to events resonated, there were some aspects of the story, like her life in Taiwan with her parents ending in cutting off contact, and the circumstances behind her adoption of her daughter Lee felt a bit too far fetched. However, as a whole, the novel is a quietly impactful read, recommended for anyone interested in an introspective story of shaking off inertia and trying something new for contentment.

'For now that she was a widow with children, Joan felt she understood with real clarity the cycle of life— the ultimate end and all that currently lay in between and the eternal problem that there didn’t seem to be enough there.'

Thanks to NetGalley and the Scribner publishing group for an ARC, the review is entirely honest.

🌟🌟🌟🌟
[One star for the premise and the whole book; One star for the characters and their arcs; Half a star for the plot and themes; 3/4 star for the world-building; 3/4 star for the writing - 4 stars in total.]

The main character is a Taiwanese immigrant who settles in California and begins her life. This novel follows her difficult early days and her later journey as a wife and mother. While I moved through this book quickly and enjoyed the writing, I can't say that I really liked the main character or many of the supporting characters. I felt the concept of the satisfaction cafe was included way to late in the book for it to have an impact on my enjoyment of the novel. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC.

2.5 stars.

I had to think a bit before getting the review posted, it's really tough for me to separate by issues with the editors' choice description from the content of the book.

The description makes this seem like the Cafe is going to be the focus, maybe a little bit of a cozy end of life exploration, good conversations with characters passing through. I was expecting something in the same vibe lane as Dallergut Dream Storeor Before the Coffee Gets Cold. This is an absolute tragic book that follows the main character from young adulthood into death, and her life is so freaking sad and full of trauma. We don't even get to the cafe until nearly the end of the story! Really, really poor advertising. So, with that in mind, it's completely possibly I wasn't in the right mindset for this story and it definitely tinted my experience.

The writing itself wasn't bad, there were very relatable parts of questioning existence and trying to balance parenthood without becoming your parent. I enjoyed getting to see some of the other characters perspectives as well. After finally landing in the Cafe, I just wanted to linger and stay there, but then the story was over. It was hard for me to really enjoy or love many of the characters, it felt a little like moral greyness done wrong? Like everyone was just, two-dimensional or didn't really feel like they had good reasons for actions. There were also many repetitive lines, not similar wording referring to big life events, but nearly word for word recollections that were repeated on the next or same page. (This could be alluding to the finale of the book, but it felt more like a composition issue).

I would instead recommend this book to someone looking for a family drama, a reckoning with age and ageism, someone who wants a story featuring the 80s-90s Taiwanese-American experience and a woman coming to terms with trauma and abuse, and a person who enjoyed "A Little Life" or "The Berry Pickers".

I really enjoyed the beginning of this novel. The story of Joan was really compelling. I loved (hated) her relationship with her first husband or at least how she was portrayed within it and then her next. once it got into more with her two children I felt like it strayed a bit. I just never really connected with the kids. The writing is very good, but I think somehow once it started talking about the children as they got older, I didn’t quite connect. That said I still think it’s a beautiful Book and I would recommend it.

Thank you Kathy Wang, NetGalley, and the publisher for providing me a copy.

I can’t pinpoint what it was, but I was hooked, I got into it, and the writing kept me going and kept me turning the pages!

As an immigrant myself, I expected more social and cultural differences. It was highlighted in the beginning when Joan went to Chinese restaurants and such, but less and less afterwards. It was barely noticeable until her son commented on her attitude. "You know. When you answer questions bluntly and pretend you don't know it's rude because English isn't your first language." Ouch!

This book is called The Satisfaction Cafe, but the cafe comes in real late in the story, and I thought it would be more about it; maybe the title doesn’t fit? I also have a hard time understanding this business if I’m being honest 😄

Joan is supposedly a student from Stanford, but what a naive person… And this is where the writing comes to highlight the unknown cultural and social rules that Joan faces all her life, rules she doesn't understand because she hasn't grown up with these expectations, and what she learned is not what people expect from her. She navigates all of it the best she can, usually by remaining quiet. I bet Joan in Taiwan would have been completely different, because I in France am a complete different person.

The end for Joan was poignant, really well written. However, the end of the book felt abrupt.

I'm glad I got to read it, as a French immigrant in the US, I did relate in some aspects to Joan.

You’re On the Guestlist

In “Satisfaction Cafe,” Kathy Wang presents an extremely complex and compelling protagonist, Joan Liang. She was born in Taiwan to parents who never liked her and considered her a liability. By a stroke of luck, it was she, and not her more valued brothers, who was sent off to California to study at Stanford. Her marriage to a Chinese man is short lived, ending abruptly when she stabs him. Soon afterwards, she accepted a marriage proposal from Bill, a wealthy older man with three previous marriages. Their union faced considerable scrutiny from both their families, especially Bill's children.

At this point in the story, Joan’s life seems to have followed a haphazard path, not anything she could have planned. In many respects she seems to have been passive, more an observer of what is happening. However, she demonstrated assertiveness when she confronted her first husband and later took drastic action to protect her son from a bully.

Joan’s situation changes and, as her children get on with their lives, she finds herself increasingly isolated. A chance conversation with a stranger prompts Joan to recognize the desire people have for communication and the need to tell their story to someone who listens. This resurrects an old fantasy:

“When she was little, she used to daydream of a place she named in her head the Satisfaction Café, which had friendly employees and nice food and pretty toys; even as a child, Joan’s imagination had not stretched to fantastic outcomes but, rather, a reasonable amount of happiness.”

Joan opens the Satisfaction Cafe with a simple philosophy: people want to be heard. She recruits various types of people for her customers to open up to. She tells her staff that people just want to be asked about themselves. “Ask questions— about them! If they look troubled, ask what is bothering them! Everyone is interesting— you just have to discover what it is.”

While the title might suggest the cafe is present throughout the book, it only appears in the final third. Also, this is character-driven with emotional depth rather than employing dramatic plot devices. Some may find this too slow, though I personally enjoyed it. It has been written more than once that Anne Tyler and Elizabeth Strout fans are likely to appreciate this book, which should give you a good indication of its style.

I just found Joan fascinating and unpredictable… in other words, very authentic. She is someone I would like to find myself at a table with.

Thank you to Scribner Books and NetGalley for providing an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review. #SatisfactionCafe

I found this to be one of those books that I reflect on while I’m not reading it. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I started The Satisfaction Cafe on my Kindle at the same time I started another book in print. Due to a self-imposed reading strategy, I wanted to finish the other first. (I did. Three stars.)

But this book...this is the one I wanted to sit and devour. It kept me powering through the other so I could get back to it!

It's the character-driven story of Joan, a young woman who leaves Taiwan for California, marries, divorces soon thereafter, marries again, raises two kids, and starts a business. It sounds simple and straightforward, but you get swept up in the arc of it all! The personalities, their relationships, the complications. It's a beautiful story of life and death, connection, and contentment.

Thank you so much NetGalley and Scribner for the pleasure of reading a review copy. I'm better for it.

This is a neutral 3 star rating as I’m pausing this book and hoping to come back to it soon. Mood reading wins again, and after the first chapter I wasn’t compelled to keep going right now.

Joan Liang's upbringing in Taiwan was harsh, as the youngest child and only daughter and with not very loving parental role models. So it makes sense that she would embrace the opportunity to live abroad, and to set boundaries for herself upon marrying Martin Liu, a fellow Stanford student. But after that marriage spectacularly crashed and burned in its nascency, Joan's world again became quiet and small and I was frustrated that such a lovely young woman with an elite degree in Mathematics was working in a restaurant, but then so happy for her when she happened to meet and fall in love with an older wealthy white man, Bill Lauder.

The story of their marriage, as they struggled and rather unconventionally became first a family, and ultimately were separated, was a compelling and relatable one; however, as an Asian-American mom myself I was saddened by Joan's complete abandonment by her birth family and of her core culture. I kept expecting the Lauders to vacation in Taiwan, or for anybody to make an effort at reconnecting with a Liang anywhere. Simply put I was dissatisfied with the very Lauder-centric and Liang-not basis of the majority of this book. With that said, I did tear through this read in a weekend, and have great respect for the author's writing skills, I highlighted many witty turns of phrase, this was my favorite: he'd spun the wheel of wife roulette so many times...

I enjoyed this book very much. Kathy Wang can capture the essense of characters so well. I felt a strong connection to the characters, as if I actually knew them. Thank you, NetGalley!

I know it so well that I'll never forget this book and how much it made me feel, how it had made a strong impact on my brain and how I'll never e the same ever again...
full rtc

I really enjoyed the story and the characters, I just felt that overall the book moved too slowly for my liking. The book starts out strong, a strong immigrant woman, domestic abuse, standing up for herself. Joan ends up marrying again, an older American, and we follow her quiet but happy and comfortable life. After her children are grown, she opens a cafe, where we get to watch her life unfold. The characters were great, the story was interesting, but it was definitely a slower read. I enjoyed the messages shared throughout the book and the insight into not only family dynamics but a family where one member was an immigrant. Overall, this was enjoyable.

Thank you netgalley for my advanced reader copy.

Thanks to NetGalley and Scribner

I really struggled with this book. I loved Wang's debut novel, THE FAMILY TRUST, but was tepid on her follow-up IMPOSTER SYNDROME. What remained from book to book is that Wang is an adept writer, at the line level. Each sentence pulls you along, irregardless of the plot. I found the first half of THE SATISFACTION CAFE engaging and Joan is a great character to follow--her life until she's sent to America is so passive (as the third child, and the only girl, she's essentially ignored by her family). Her passivity continues in America until she explodes on her husband, Milton. I hoped that the book would continue with these sorts of impactful explosions as Joan figured out who she wanted to become, but once she marries her second husband, the book became more of a character study and there was no appearance of the titular Satisfaction Cafe until much too far into the book.

Perhaps this is a case of marketing not knowing how to promote what this book is but given the description, the execution felt disappointing.

Happy pub day, Wang.

The Satisfaction Café’s main character, Joan Liang, immigrates from Taiwan to America, divorces her first husband in her early twenties, and at 26 marries a Bill (51). Bill is an upper-middle-class white man who serially marries women, and when Joan recognizes his infidelity, she ignores it. Instead, she focuses on navigating Bill’s rich friend group as a stay-at-home mom, attentively raising her kids and keeping the home. When Bill dies, the house he leaves her burns in a fire, and it turns out he didn’t accumulate enough savings for his family. Joan’s single-mother responsibilities pile on as her teenage kids experience normal teen probs, and their relationships continue through highs and lows until the end of Joan’s life. Before her planned death, though, Joan pursues a new dream of becoming a small business owner. Her Satisfaction Café offers a space for customers to schedule chats with employees to combat loneliness and isolation.

The novel moves quickly and never gives me the space to burrow into the characters’ minds. In other words, the pacing and intentional degrees of distance between characters (across the board) and the reader leave me mentally unstimulated. It remains unclear to me why Joan loses contact with her parents, and I’m assuming she requires the boundary from the adults who never loved her. It could be true that she’s able to cut ties completely, but this absence of filial piety seems culturally unbelievable to me, especially given the timing of the story. The plot also perplexes me: Wang introduces the café maybe two-thirds into the book; given the title, I expected the café to exist earlier on in the story so that it would feel more central. Additionally, I wasn’t believing the effectiveness of this space that draws the crowds. On the one hand, as successful as the store is, I didn’t witness the positive influence on customers’ lives, except that readers are informed that some become regulars. On the other hand, the café brings together the employees, including the two adult children, and maybe this emphasis matters more to Wang. Ultimately, Wang may have developed The Satisfaction Café more for my preferences, and her newest didn’t work for me. This confuses me because Wang is a seasoned author. What am I missing? But even the reviews about the complex characters as a feat don’t sway me; I imagine I could list a number of recent reads that excel at this particular task.

My thanks to Scribner and NetGalley for an ARC. I shared this review on GoodReads on July 1, 2025 (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7653740330).

Joan Liang continually experiences the unexpected: she never thought she’d leave Taiwan for the Bay. She never thought her first marriage would end. She never thought she’d fall in love with an older man on Stanford’s campus. She never thought she’d have kids. She never thought she’d grow older. She never thought she’d be satisfied. So that’s exactly what she sets out to do. She creates the Satisfaction Cafe, a cozy cafe where patrons pay for someone to talk to, and it becomes an unexpected hit. Joan unexpectedly becomes a legacy.

I walked into this novel without any expectations, and I was truly blown away! I admit that it was a bit of a slow start for me before I fell into the groove, but I became so invested in Joan’s life (and her trials and tribulations). But the storytelling was just so beautiful, and so richly layered that it’s hard to believe this is a novel and not a memoir. Joan oscillates between being a hero and an antihero as the plot of her own life changes, and that’s precisely what kept me wanting to turn the page. I will definitely be recommending this to all!

Reviewed as part of #ARC from NetGalley. Many thanks to Scribner Books for the opportunity to read and review.

Read this book if you like:
☕ cozy and slow-burn storytelling
🎨 vivid, rich observations on the human condition
⏱️plots that span decades and a lifetime


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This review will be posted to Instagram @AutobiographiCole on 7/2/25.

The Satisfaction Cafe was my first foray into Kathy Wang's writing but I was really wowed by the way she writes her characters. A carefully done character study in the vein of Celeste Ng, The Satisfaction Cafe is the story of Joan, a Taiwanese immigrant to the US, whose first marriage sets her adrift and second marriage complete recharts her life's path.

There isn't a ton of plot here, and Joan is not the most likeable character, but I found it thoughtfully written.

I've enjoyed this author's previous novels and her latest is my favorite (so far!). If you are looking for a lot of action, this may not be for you but if you love literary fiction and something more cerebral, this one is so well written and interesting. Give it a try!

The Satisfaction Café comes out next week on July 1, 2025, and you can purchase HERE!

Joan Liang's life in America began in Palo Alto, where she lived in the attic of a two-story home on Azalea Street. Joan did chores for the widow who owned the house in exchange for reduced rent; she never could have afforded such a nice neighborhood otherwise. She lived in that attic until she was married, and she was married for only six weeks before she stabbed her husband. Joan was twenty-five and had lived in the United States for two years. The year was 1975.

Joan had not thought she would stab her husband. It had been an accident (sort of). Afterward she was disappointed that marriage had not turned out as she'd imagined. She had thought it would be wonderful. It had been, actually. Until it wasn't.
Though later, Joan would wonder why she'd ever thought marriage would be so special. As a child in Taiwan, most of the married women Joan encountered were melancholy, if not outright miserable; throughout her childhood, Joan's own mother had on occasion risen from the kitchen table without warning to cry with showy force into her hands.

4/5 stars
The Satisfaction Café is a beautifully introspective, slow-burn novel that follows Joan from her early days in Taiwan to her complicated life in America. Kathy Wang does a fantastic job bringing Joan’s quiet resilience to life, making you feel like you’re walking alongside her through every heartbreak, misstep, and small triumph.

Joan’s journey is anything but straightforward. From a disastrous first marriage to navigating her role as wife to a wealthy older man, her life is shaped by assumptions, stereotypes, and emotional landmines. But what really stands out is how Wang explores the theme of satisfaction—what it means in love, family, success, and identity. Joan’s experience as an immigrant, a mother, and a woman trying to build a meaningful life gives this book emotional depth that lingers.

Though the titular café doesn’t appear until late in the story, it serves as a beautiful metaphor for human connection and healing. Joan’s relationships—with her children, her past, and herself—are the real heart of the novel. The pacing slows at times, but it never drags, and the emotional richness keeps you fully engaged.

Thoughtful, tender, and quietly powerful, this is a character-driven story that asks big questions about fulfillment, belonging, and the messy contradictions that make us human. Definitely worth the read.

I loved the mix of humor and heart in this story. It had me thinking, kept me entertained and I loved the pacing. I think this would be an amazing book club book as well, hopefully one of the big ones picks it up!