Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf for a copy of this arc, all opinions my own.

This was an interesting semi autobiographical novel. I was drawn in from the beginning but then towards the half way point I started to lose interest. The story just didn't continue to capture me. I struggled to finish the last half, but I am glad I did. Overall an interesting look at a complicated mother/daughter relationship.

This novel, in which the author speaks candidly with her deceased mother, is roughly based on the life of the author's Shanghainese mother, who had left war torn Shanghai in the late 1930s just before the Communist take over of the city. The story also covers the extended family who had stayed behind in China, how they fared and what they experienced after the Communist takeover and the different stages of that era, including the great land reform and the Cultural Revolution.

The author's tense relationship with her mother is the major theme. A mother who calls her Bad Bad Girl! whenever the mother is dismayed by the things that her outspoken and curious daughter will say. Far from being a traditionally obedient daughter, who defers to her parents and her traditional Chinese culture, the author asks too many "Why Why Why" questions, and is too opinionated and unorthodox in her views. "No one will marry you" is her mother's constant chant.

History, culture, immigration, mother-daughter relationships - just some of the topics handled with humor and also with some sadness, nostalgia, and regret.

This book was not to my taste and I’m probably not the best audience for this book. Her definition of ‘abuse’ is very different from my definition and own experience. I felt it was windy and self-indulgent. Thank you NetGalley and Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor for giving me the opportunity to read this advanced copy.

My rating is somewhere between a 3.5 and a 4. out of 5. I read this book expecting an informative reflection on how Chinese conventions of the family and gender refract across generations and continents. I knew it was semi-autobiographical, but I also expected to learn about broader cultural and historical themes. I had not read anything by this author before, though from the way the book is written, you get the sense that she expects us to have a general sense of her prior works. I ended up having very mixed feelings about the book. The author is at her best when she is portraying her childhood reactions to her mother's China-informed behavioral and familial expectations. She is at her worst when she falls into repetitive grumbling about her mother's scarring inability to love and praise her in the American fashion. It took me a couple of chapters to get into the book, and I enjoyed much of the middle part of the book. The last few chapters, however, shifted dramatically in tone and were more of a space for the author's ruminations on her failed relationship with her mother. Gone were the interesting (yet culturally revealing) dialogues, and instead, we got more of the author's voice. I guess if I were a prior fan of the author, I would have had more patience for this shift in focus and writing style. However, not knowing the writer's prior works, I found myself bored and inpatient with the author in the last few chapters. The book had potential, but it could have used a strong editor's hand to keep the tone and style more consistent.

The most compelling aspect of this autobiographical novel was its voice. Gish Jen captured imagined posthumous conversations between mother and daughter with a blunt and sometimes frustrating, though ultimately lovable tone. We learn about her mother's upbringing and tenacity as well as her own relationship to her memories. The characteristics in herself that she found most troubling or troublesome seemed to be the same that she criticized in her daughter. Jen showed the complicated dance between the two in a heart wrenching way, yet also managed to convey warmth.

Bad Bad Girl captivated me from the first pages.The story of a difficult mother daughter relationship is something a lot of us can relate to ..Gish Jen is an author boho I always have enjoyed ,this book has me laughing out loud and emotionally relating a wonderful read.

I loved that this was an autobiographical fiction hybrid book! Having a difficult relationship with your mother is so common and I think it will resonate with a lot of people, from many different backgrounds. This was my first novel by the author, and I will be sure to go back and read more of her novels.

I really enjoyed reading this book. The mix of fiction, biography, and memoir really worked for me, especially given the focus of mother/daughter relationships. It may be the first book I’ve read that was (I assume) started during COVID that is actually good! Lastly, the author says at the end that she knows some readers won’t like it because it’s not funny. Not true! It takes on some heavy topics, but I also laughed out loud several times. Big thank you to Knopf for providing the ARC.

Bad Bad Girl by Gish Jen is a partial memoir about generational trauma and to a lesser extent about the life experiences of Chinese immigrants to the United States and their families left behind to suffer during the Cultural revolution. The book unfolds as a conversation between Jen and her recently deceased mother Agnes (neé Loo Shu-hsin). Agnes, born in 1925, had a privileged upbringing in Shanghai where she faced strict expectations as a daughter of a socially prominent family and had a tumultuous relationship with her mother who often criticized her as a “bad bad girl.” In many ways, her education was atypical for girls of her time as was her decision to pursue higher education in the United States.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Agnes recapitulates her difficult mother-daughter relationship with her own daughter Gish (neé Lillian). While placing her first born son on a pedestal, and lauding her younger daughter as a beauty, she offers nothing but scorn and outright neglect to Gish. Though Gish’s father is also very strict and has extreme views about the suitability of corporal punishment, his biggest challenge is getting along with Agnes.
Because Gish did not have enough verifiable facts to write a non-fiction book, this book is a hybrid memoir/novel. The conversations she has with her mother occur in her head which was sometimes confusing. I found the descriptions of parental violence toward Gish and her siblings difficult to read. I also had trouble with Gish’s unwavering desire for the mother she wanted as opposed to the mother she had. The book examines the dynamics of the mother/daughter relationship and the impact of cultural expectations. The ending is optimistic, showing that Gish Jen treats both her son and daughter well, marking the end of the cycle of abuse.
Thank you to Netgalley and Knopf for the eARC in exchange for this review.

Bad Bad Girl, a memoir by GishJen, tells an emotionally painful story of three generations of Chinese women and how their complicated relationships with their sons and daughters affect generations that follow. It read like a cathartic experience for Jen, as she resurrects from family lore the interactions between her mother, grandmother and their spouses. In our current news, we often hear of the challenges women face in the Middle East, but only recently are we beginning to read about the trials for Asian women in first person accounts.

Letters between Jen’s mother and her family who remained in China provide good source material, however the true impact of the communist takeover of China were assumed from the overly complementary remarks about how well the Communist government was running the company and how wise they were to take over private property and divide up among the population.

I found the construction of the “conversations” between Jen and her mother a little disjointed but later discovered some of the reasons for these interjected conversations. Jen’s voice is first person, but so is her mother’s which sometimes caused me to go back to see which mother or father was being referenced. The change in typeface helped.

Overall, Gish Jen delivered another great read, not necessarily my favorite of her work, but definitely I feel like I know her much better from this memoir.

I hate to give this is a low rating, because of how personal it is. But sadly I just couldn't get into it.

Gish Jen wrote parallel stories. One of her mother Aggie’s cold, abusive childhood caused by her own mother and the other as she carried it on to the next generation, to Gish. It is a poignant book of generational trauma.
Bad, Bad Girl is a novel written as the author mourns the death of her mother. Aggie was always cold and disapproving. Inside these pages are the unspoken conversations and desire for intimacy that Gish can only have in her imagination after her mother has died. She is not the Number One Son and she is not the Cute Daughter. What is her value to her mother? To ask questions is an annoyance, to disagree is wrong, yet that is something both Gish and Agnes did as girls. Both were bad girls.
Her mother could have stopped the chain of hurt and abuse but she didn’t. Her assimilation and marriage didn’t go as she foresaw. The complexities of the loving and abusive parents were intricate. While Gish stuck with her mother Aggie turned her back on hers as she suffered under the Cultural revolution.
Mother/daughter relationships can be loving and angry. Bad, Bad Girl explored this and other themes. While heartbreaking it was fascinating to learn about Chinese customs. I believe this was worthy of 5 stars.
I would like to thank NetGalley and Knopf for an ARC of this book. These opinions are my own.

Perhaps I am just missing something here. The author made clear from the beginning that she was writing about her mother, but didn't have enough historical info and detail to make it non-fiction, so it was fictionalized. But she inserted so many facts about herself (school, publication names, etc)., that it often felt like a memoir. Gish never used her mother's first name, but did use her father's first name. Included were sidebar commentary, conversations between author and mother, discussing the actual story. It was not clear until halfway through that these were conversations Gish was having in her head with her dead mother, reflecting on the past. I felt that the structure severely impeded the flow of the storyline.

I feel so fortunate to have been able to read an advanced copy of this book… what a gift. I was immediately captivated by the writing style and the premise, but it was even better than I could’ve hoped. Not all advance copies are as amazing you dream, but gosh this one was. I feel so lucky. A beautiful and creative act of mourning. So funny and yet so sad. I am so eager to read the other works by Gish, I feel so glad to have discovered her work via this book, I feel now as though I know her and it’s a beautiful lens with which to view her other works.

Bad Bad Girl is a biography, a memoir, a fantasy, and an extraordinary piece of work. Jen chronicles her mother's story, a journey from China to America, from an ambitious young scholar to a depressed parent struggling to deal with the family she left behind and the obligations of following Chinese customs and mindsets even while trying to assimilate in the US. Jen writes about her father as well, a violent man whose behavior worsened the more he felt he was losing control of his family. And of course she writes about how her upbringing--and that of her siblings--created rifts and disparities between them that can never be rectified. The writing is immediate and honest and compelling, and offers opportunities for thinking about parent-child relationships and how parents value (or don't value) their children, and the complexities of how adults might still love parents who were abusive to them. This will be a top choice for book groups when it comes out, and for excellent reasons.

a story about a girl who grows up with a difficult relationship with her mother. it might sound niche but this book was written with such a universality that i think anyone can relate -- to loving someone and wanting to be loved in return in the way that you think you deserve. the perfect book to sit down with at a coffee shop and contemplate about your own ties to your family in ways that are painful, poignant, but beautiful all at once

Gish Jen has long been one of my favorite writers. This novel is an outstanding piece of writing. It gave me an incredible view of Chinese culture and life. The book is written as though she is having a conversation with her mother and her mother is telling the story of her life. It begins with when she is a very young child of a very wealthy, influential family in China and ends with her living in a much reduced state outside of NYC.
It's a harsh telling, with some emotion, but mostly the realities of what she worked to endure and struggled through her own intelligence and drive to accomplish.
This is a serious book and should be read by anyone interested in Chinese history and Chinese culture and social life, both in China and in America.

I enjoyed reading this book immensely. Maybe it is because I have a difficult mother, who is still alive, but I can so relate to so many of the themes of the book; I felt it was universal.

Gish Jen takes us deep inside her life story with her mother who came to America as a young woman on her own to get a PhD at Columbia. Her journey from a well-to-do Shanghai family into New York university life is overwhelming even though she has a small group of other Chinese students, and has her church life to bolster her. Her fortitude keeps her going, and her will to stay makes her enterprising as her money dwindles and news from home gets more desperate. Even though she is a good, dedicated student, she ends up marrying a fellow Chinese engineer from Shanghai and although she plans on studying she starts to have a family and abandon her studies.

Bad Bad Girl alternates between the mother’s story, and Jen’s family and her own story in the family. Jen is the family bad girl, and she has a very difficult relationship with her mother as she grows up, just as her mother had a difficult relationship with her mother. As Jen grows she tries to make sense of her mother, and tries to understand why her mother made her the family bad girl even though she has another sister and didn’t really warrant the role.

Jen Gish is a fine author, and she really draws us into her family, and brings the reader into a beautiful story about her life, her mother and her whole family. Poignant, loving, imaginative and vulnerable all at the same time. Sit down with a good cup of tea, you will not be disappointed.

A riveting novel that screamed generational trauma passed down from mother to daughter to the next. This definitely was a tough read for someone who has to mourn their mother alive and after death.. along with the relationship they wish they had. Although this isn't my usual genre personally..I thoroughly enjoyed the sequences between Gish and her mother and the hardships that molded their relationship to what it was. Even after death, Gish can hear her mother's voice. A constant reminder of the bad, bad girl she was always told to be. Overall, this book was an easy read, hard to put down and pleasantly surprising. Thank you to Netgalley and Random House for this Arc in exchange for an honest review

Bad Bad Girl by Gish Jen is a poignant and powerful autobiographical novel exploring mother-daughter relationships, cultural displacement, and generational trauma. Jen masterfully portrays Aggie, a woman torn between tradition and ambition, and her daughter, struggling under the weight of inherited expectations. The prose is both lyrical and deeply moving, with a unique narrative device where Jen converses with her late mother. Heartbreaking yet filled with humanity, this novel lingers long after the final page. A truly compelling read.