The Mothers: Suyuan Woo, An-mei Hsu, Lindo Jong, and Ying-ying St. Clair

When all four of these women arrived in America, they carried a lot of emotional baggage: Suyuan had abandoned her twin daughters, An-mei’s mother committed suicide in order to give her daughter a better life, Ying-ying had aborted her son, and Lindo used guile to escape a horrible marriage. For the most part, they came to America from exceedingly restricted worlds, and all of them bear hope that their daughters might live better, less tragic lives.