SPRING FRAGRANCE is a collection of short stories by the first published Asian North American fiction writer, Sui Sin Far, that offers a glimpse into the lives of Chinese Americans in the early 20th century living in San Francisco and Seattle. The introduction by C Pam Zhang helps orient the readers to the fact that this book was written for White people to educate them about the Chinese American experience.

Far explores themes of cultural clashes, such as the patriarchal traditions of Chinese men toward Chinese women and cutting off vs. keeping one's queue. Other topics, like expecting immigrants to take up English and American culture while forever siloing them as an "immigrant/alien," are still relevant today.

Because SPRING FRAGRANCE is written for a White audience, the stories center on well-educated Chinese men & virtuous Chinese women and how they are "beneficial" to whiteness. After more than 100 years, I'm glad to see modern novels that tell inclusive stories of all immigrants and paint a much more diverse picture of all walks of life. Of course, there is still a lot of work to do, but I'm glad I could see the progress from SPRING FRAGRANCE to immigrant stories published recently.