A 2020 PEN America Literary Awards Finalist for Debut Short Story Collection, Mimi Lok's Last of Her Name narrates the interconnected lives of diasporic women from ’80s UK suburbia to WWII Hong Kong and contemporary California
Mimi Lok’s Last of Her Name is an eye-opening story collection about the intimate, interconnected lives of diasporic women and the histories they are born into. Set in a wide range of time periods and locales, including ’80s UK suburbia, WWII Hong Kong and contemporary urban California, the book features an eclectic cast of outsiders: among them, an elderly housebreaker, wounded lovers and kung-fu fighting teenage girls. Last of Her Name offers a meditation on female desire and resilience, family and the nature of memory.
Mimi Lok is a Chinese writer and editor. Born and raised in the UK, she holds an MFA in creative writing from San Francisco State University. Her writing has been published or is forthcoming in McSweeney’s, Lucky Peach, Nimrod and Hyphen, among other publications. She is the cofounder, Executive Director and Editor of Voice of Witness, an award-winning nonprofit that illuminates human rights issues through an oral-history book series (published by Haymarket and Verso) and a national education program.
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
Dave Eggers
A mesmerizing and deeply felt debut that affirms all that is great about short fiction. ‘The Woman In the Closet’ has to be considered a new classic. Lok’s collection brings startling intimacy to her characters, all of them struggling with dislocation and belonging within the Chinese diaspora. I can’t think of a collection that better speaks to this moment of global movement and collective rupture from homes and history, and the struggle to find meaning despite it all.
The Millions
The effect [of Last of Her Name] is a kaleidoscope of female desire, family, and resilience.
The Rumpus
Mimi Lok’s Last of Her Name is an eye-opening story collection about the intimate, interconnected lives of diasporic women and the histories they are born into.
Kirkus Reviews
Are disconnection and loneliness inevitable side effects of modern life or of living in diaspora? These stories [in Mimi Lok's Last of Her Name] raise intriguing questions but do not attempt any simple answers.
Electric Literature
Ruth Mina Buchwald
In this eclectic and humorous debut collection, Lok intimately explores the lives of her Chinese diasporic characters as they wander through a lonely world, searching for emotional connection.
Booklist
Through eight provocative stories, Lok’s sharp gaze transforms disconnection and longing with compelling results.
Cleveland Scene
Spanning all different times and places, this moving collection should not be overlooked when it comes to literary award season.
Craft Literary
Rachel Khong
Assured and keenly observed stories about the devastations—large and small—that transpire between people. Rendered in prose that’s no-nonsense, darkly funny, and lovely all at once, Lok’s stories carry quiet but undeniable impact. This is a book that stays with you long after you’ve put it down. It makes you wonder, as good books should, what on earth is going on in each of our brains.
Ms. Magazine
Karla Strand
Lok’s attention to detail and reflective connections make for an intimate and layered experience, for the characters and their readers.
San Francisco Chronicle
Alexis Hurling
Mimi Lok’s “Last of Her Name” is a smorgasbord of powerful writing and angsty emotion wrapped into eight meditations on what it means to feel slightly out of place ... her stories are insightful, painfully honest and deeply unsettling — a dynamite combination in a new writer on the scene.
New York Times: Book Review
Siobhan Jones
Lok has written the kind of understated book you catch yourself thinking about weeks after you finish it. Absorbing and deeply human, these characters — who either live in China or are of the Chinese diaspora — feel more like people you might’ve known than like fictitious renderings of Lok’s imagination. A pleasure to read and mull over for days.
Publishers Weekly
[An] impressive debut. ... Lok is an expert at peeking into the souls of those who have been displaced or disregarded ... this touching collection is easy to pick up and hard to put down.
Los Angeles Times
These stories are tough, gorgeous and humane. They feel universal and also deeply specific. I loved the brash intelligence, the way this debut collection can be fun, funny and incredibly serious. How many versions of each one of us are there? One hopes Lok will have time to find more.
Ploughshares
In her debut story collection, Last of Her Name, Mimi Lok is not interested in providing answers or pat endings. The stories open up, instead, in the way of myth or fairy tale, transcending the story itself.
Poets & Writers
Whether in seven pages or fifty, Lok brings each story to life in clear, precise prose, and draws the reader’s eye to strangeness and injustice without slipping into a didactic tone.
NPR
Michael Schaub
Lok writes with the self-assuredness of a literary veteran and the insight of someone who's spent a lifetime studying how humans interact.
Largehearted Boy
Mimi Lok's collection Last of Her Name features empathetically drawn characters whose lonely lives haunt the reader long after the book is closed.
A 2020 PEN America Literary Awards Finalist for Debut Short Story Collection
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FORMAT: Pbk, 5.5 x 8.5 in. / 192 pgs. LIST PRICE: U.S. $16.95 LIST PRICE: CANADA $24.95 GBP £14.99 ISBN: 9781885030610 PUBLISHER: Kaya Press AVAILABLE: 10/22/2019 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Active AVAILABILITY: In stock TERRITORY: NA LA EUR ASIA AU/NZ AFR ME
A 2020 PEN America Literary Awards Finalist for Debut Short Story Collection, Mimi Lok's Last of Her Name narrates the interconnected lives of diasporic women from ’80s UK suburbia to WWII Hong Kong and contemporary California
Published by Kaya Press. By Mimi Lok.
Mimi Lok’s Last of Her Name is an eye-opening story collection about the intimate, interconnected lives of diasporic women and the histories they are born into. Set in a wide range of time periods and locales, including ’80s UK suburbia, WWII Hong Kong and contemporary urban California, the book features an eclectic cast of outsiders: among them, an elderly housebreaker, wounded lovers and kung-fu fighting teenage girls. Last of Her Name offers a meditation on female desire and resilience, family and the nature of memory.
Mimi Lok is a Chinese writer and editor. Born and raised in the UK, she holds an MFA in creative writing from San Francisco State University. Her writing has been published or is forthcoming in McSweeney’s, Lucky Peach, Nimrod and Hyphen, among other publications. She is the cofounder, Executive Director and Editor of Voice of Witness, an award-winning nonprofit that illuminates human rights issues through an oral-history book series (published by Haymarket and Verso) and a national education program.
