Where to find it: It is available in bookstores and libraries.
What is it, in summary?: I don't think I can do better than this summary/review, but to give my own brief summary: Zhang Zhong Shan is a mid-level construction engineer living in a version of the US that is a satellite state of Communist China. He is gay, he is half Chinese and half Mexican, but has had genetic surgery performed to allow him to pass as fully Chinese, and he has to mask his race and sexuality in order to navigate his society. The novel alternates between chapters from Zhang's perspective and chapters from other people's perspective. Zhang is not a mover or shaker in this world. His trials and tribulations are things like "the boss wants you to go on a date with his daughter, and you have to tank it, but not so badly that you get fired", or "how do you figure out how to meet other gay people when you move to a new area where the norms are different and more restrictive".
What do you love about it?: The novel is a poignant and touching exploration of loneliness, isolation, oppression, and connection. It is almost like a variant of cyberpunk, in that the futuristic technology that pervades th novel is, rather than made grim and gritty: banal. The sheen and futurity and excitement of the technology is stripped away, as it becomes part of the Sisyphean burden of just living one's life under oppression (and depression).
What sort of things are you likely to request for it?: The novel is a "mosaic novel", so interwoven with Zhang's story are chapters with other characters who intersect Zhang's life at tangents. Almost like a short story collection in parallel with Zhang's story (but with more narrative coherence than this suggests). Their stories are told, to some extent in outline, leaving lots of room for worldbuilding or just expansion on their particular stories, which are left incomplete.
Are there sections of canon (rather than the whole canon) that can be consumed by themselves to fulfill your requests, or that showcase particular characters and relationships?: n/a
Content warnings (ie, rape, incest, racism, gore/violence): The novel has a lot of racism depicted throughout, and there are some racist terms (used diagetically) especially early on; that caught me off guard when I first read it. There are some depictions of injuries, a suicide, and a sexual assault. There may be some other content in these neighborhoods that I am neglecting, but those are the major ones that come to mind.
Rec: China Mountain Zhang (Maureen McHugh, 1992)
Media: Novel
Approx length: 313 Pages
Where to find it: It is available in bookstores and libraries.
What is it, in summary?: I don't think I can do better than this summary/review, but to give my own brief summary: Zhang Zhong Shan is a mid-level construction engineer living in a version of the US that is a satellite state of Communist China. He is gay, he is half Chinese and half Mexican, but has had genetic surgery performed to allow him to pass as fully Chinese, and he has to mask his race and sexuality in order to navigate his society. The novel alternates between chapters from Zhang's perspective and chapters from other people's perspective. Zhang is not a mover or shaker in this world. His trials and tribulations are things like "the boss wants you to go on a date with his daughter, and you have to tank it, but not so badly that you get fired", or "how do you figure out how to meet other gay people when you move to a new area where the norms are different and more restrictive".
What do you love about it?: The novel is a poignant and touching exploration of loneliness, isolation, oppression, and connection. It is almost like a variant of cyberpunk, in that the futuristic technology that pervades th novel is, rather than made grim and gritty: banal. The sheen and futurity and excitement of the technology is stripped away, as it becomes part of the Sisyphean burden of just living one's life under oppression (and depression).
What sort of things are you likely to request for it?: The novel is a "mosaic novel", so interwoven with Zhang's story are chapters with other characters who intersect Zhang's life at tangents. Almost like a short story collection in parallel with Zhang's story (but with more narrative coherence than this suggests). Their stories are told, to some extent in outline, leaving lots of room for worldbuilding or just expansion on their particular stories, which are left incomplete.
Are there sections of canon (rather than the whole canon) that can be consumed by themselves to fulfill your requests, or that showcase particular characters and relationships?: n/a
Content warnings (ie, rape, incest, racism, gore/violence):
The novel has a lot of racism depicted throughout, and there are some racist terms (used diagetically) especially early on; that caught me off guard when I first read it. There are some depictions of injuries, a suicide, and a sexual assault. There may be some other content in these neighborhoods that I am neglecting, but those are the major ones that come to mind.