Lillian Li, "Number One Chinese Restaurant"

When a calamity suddenly halts the usual flow of daily events at the family-run Beijing Duck House in Rockville, Maryland, the owner, his family, and the staff are forced to pause and assess what they’ve done and where they go from here. For Jimmy Han, this may be the chance to open his own upscale establishment. For his brother, it might be the time to heal a festering generational rift with his daughter. Meanwhile, the Hans’ longtime employees are caught between competing loyalties when they find that their children are implicated in the restaurant’s crisis. Warm and insightful, this eagerly awaited debut novel vividly shows what happens when back-of-house and front-of-house fall apart.

Lillian Li received her BA from Princeton and her MFA from the University of Michigan. She is the recipient of a Hopwood Award in Short Fiction, as well as Glimmer Train's New Writer Award. Her work has been featured in Guernica, Granta, and Jezebel. She is from the D.C. metro area and lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Number One Chinese Restaurant is her first novel.

Founded by Carla Cohen and Barbara Meade in 1984, Politics and Prose Bookstore is Washington, D.C.'s premier independent bookstore and cultural hub, a gathering place for people interested in reading and discussing books. Politics and Prose offers superior service, unusual book choices, and a haven for book lovers in the store and online. Visit them on the web at

Produced by Tom Warren