Thank you to Ecco Books for the gifted ARC

In this short story collection following the lives of Asians & Asian Americans, Chang explores our relationships with one another through history, magical realism, and technology. Where does one’s life end and another begin?

I adore Chang’s sophomore book and am amazed by the breadth of topics she covers in TOMB SWEEPING. While individual short stories in a collection can sometimes be repetitive/forgettable, every chapter in TOMB SWEEPING is unique and intriguing.

I particularly love Chang’s excavation of death and how we memorialize it. In Unknown By Unknown, a woman grapples with the death of her career; Farewell, Hank imagines where we go after death and ponders the significance of it; Klara shows the death of a friendship as two friends enter adulthood; Me and My Algo describes the death of innocence as our lives get increasingly intertwined with tech.

The titular story examines the rippling effects of wartime deaths and asks the readers: can we truly escape from wrongful deaths and generational trauma?

TOMB SWEEPING is a brilliant and poignant short story collection that will stay with me long after finishing it. Congratulations to Chang on her sophomore novel; she has quickly become my auto-buy author, and I can’t wait to read whatever she writes next!