The 11-year-old hero of Mr. Chin's inventive, energetic first novel is educated in his Chinese heritage through a series of astonishing dreams about working on the Central Pacific Railroad in 1869.--New York Times Book Review Doubt not the ability of the gifted, passionate, funny Mr. Chin.--New Yorker
AS TWELVE-YEAR-OLD DONALD DUK BURNS 108 MODEL AIRPLANES IN MID-FLIGHT TO CELEBRATE THE CHINESE NEW YEAR, FRANK CHIN TORCHES STEREOTYPES OF ASIAN-AMERICANS.

Welcome to Chinatown, Chinese New Year in San Francisco. The day of the dog. The day of the thief. Everybody's birthday. The lantern festival of the fifteenth day. Welcome home. Crashing Cantonese opera, dancing lions, comic book heroes, and a childhood among partying pagans . . . . Little Donald Duk is a twelve-year-old kid with everything, including a name he doesn't like and a family who doesn't deserve him. As he completes his first turn around the Chinese zodiac's cycle of twelve animals, the Mandate of Heaven turns; he takes flight and dreams himself a home. As this novel opens, Donald Duk would rather be Fred Astaire than the son of a Chinatown restauranteur. Through the course of this robust, vigorous work, Donald learns to see himself more clearly as he, and we, see his culture free of distortive stereotypes.