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Last Night at the Telegraph Club

by Malinda Lo

Love and identity in 1950s Chinatown

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AlbakiReads Editorial

Love and identity in 1950s Chinatown

Set in San Francisco’s Chinatown in 1954, Malinda Lo’s novel brings Lily Hu’s emerging feelings for Kathleen Miller into contact with the risks surrounding them. Their connection begins to take shape after the girls visit the Telegraph Club, a lesbian bar, while Red Scare suspicion and the threat of deportation facing Lily’s Chinese American father place their private lives within a wider climate of insecurity. The historical setting links a young woman’s discovery of her sexuality with questions of family, citizenship, and belonging.

Good fit for readers who enjoy

  • Teens and young adults interested in historical fiction set in 1950s San Francisco.
  • Readers seeking fiction about queer identity and first love.
  • Readers interested in Chinese American family life amid Red Scare-era pressures.

Themes

Queer identity and first loveChinese American identity and belongingFamily and citizenshipRed Scare-era discrimination

Based on publisher information and book metadata.

Book overview

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD AND STONEWALL BOOK AWARD - From acclaimed author Malinda Lo comes a gripping, tender coming-of-age novel exploring identity, queerness, and historical upheaval set in San Francisco's Chinatown during the 1950s.

"Lush, ambitious and layered, Malinda Lo's sweeping historical novel is the queer romance we've been waiting for."--Ms. Magazine

Seventeen-year-old Lily Hu can't remember exactly when the feeling took root--that desire to look, to move closer, to touch. Whenever it started growing, it definitely bloomed the moment she and Kathleen Miller walked under the flashing neon sign of a lesbian bar called the Telegraph Club. Suddenly, everything seemed possible.

But America in 1954 is not a safe place for two girls to fall in love, especially not in Chinatown. Red-Scare paranoia threatens everyone, including Chinese Americans like Lily. With deportation looming over her father--despite his hard-won citizenship--Lily and Kath risk everything to let their love see the light of day.

Meticulously researched, emotionally stirring, and startlingly brave, Last Night at the Telegraph Club is a standout work of historical fiction that has taken the world by storm.

Winner of the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature - A Michael L. Printz Honor Book - A We Need Diverse Books Walter Dean Myers Honor Book - A Los Angeles Times Book Prize Finalist - A Kirkus Reviews Best Young Adult Book of the Century
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