Mazy Chan's Last Chance (Lisa Yee)

 

This book is amazing. It is well written and touches on a multitude of hot topics. It is powerful because the main character is a middle-school aged girl just trying to figure out life by observing adults. Through grandfather telling Maizy family history stories we learn about racism towards Chinese people over the last hundred years in North America. Maizy sees her family brought together to a greater understanding of each other and that not everything is as it seems.

Goodreads says:

Welcome to The Golden Palace!

Maizy has never been to Last Chance, Minnesota. . . until now. Her Mom’s plan is just to stay for a couple weeks, until her grandfather gets better. But plans change, and as Maizy spends more time in Last Chance (where she and her family are the only Asian-Americans) and at The Golden Palace—the restaurant that’s been in her family for generations—she makes some discoveries. For instance:
• You can tell a LOT about someone by the way they order food.
• And people can surprise you. Sometimes in good ways, sometimes in disappointing ways.
• And the Golden Palace has Secrets.

But the more Maizy discovers, the more questions she has. Like, why are her mom and her grandmother always fighting? Who are the people in the photographs on the office wall? And when she discovers that a beloved family treasure has gone missing—and someone has left a racist note—Maizy decides it’s time find the answers.