K-Ming Chang
Born1998 (age 25–26)
Notable workBestiary
AwardsLambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction (2023)
Websitekmingchang.com

K-Ming Chang (born 1998) is a novelist and poet. She is the author of the novel Bestiary (2020). Gods of Want won the 2023 Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction.[1][2] In 2021, Bestiary was long-listed for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.

Personal life

K-Ming Chang was born in 1998, the year of the tiger, and grew up in California.[3][4] In elementary school, she wrote a story about a girl who turns into a tiger; she later recalled it, humorously, as a "really terrible" story. This story contained the seeds of her eventual first novel, Bestiary.[5] Chang currently lives in New York.[4]

Writing

Chang is the Micro editor at The Offing magazine.[6]

Past Lives, Future Bodies (2018)

Chang published Past Lives, Future Bodies in 2018 with Black Lawrence Press.[7][8] The chapbook takes up themes of matrilineality contrasted with "volatile masculinity", writes Luiza Flynn-Goodlett.[9] In her review, Flynn-Goodlett praised the "magic conjured in this collection—lyric intensity coupled with sharp political intellect", saying "Chang emerges as an urgent, sumptuous voice, a poet of numerous gifts and intellectual dexterity".[9] Several critics remark on Chang’s use of line breaks;[10] in The Rumpus, torrin a. greathouse says they "become a blade, a letter's crease, a hinge opening the next line like a room. Her chapbook is a master class in the potential of enjambment, imbuing each break with the wonder of and trepidation of the unknown."[11]

Bestiary (2020)

Chang published her debut novel Bestiary in 2020.[12][5] She wrote it in her sophomore year in college while she was at home on summer break, taking summer courses on Asian American history. She sold Bestiary to One World, Chris Jackson's imprint at Random House, while still an undergraduate.[4] Another poetry collection was also part of the book deal.[13]

The novel tells the story of three generations of women, Daughter, Mother and Grandmother, who move from Taiwan to Arkansas.[14] After hearing Mother tell the folktale of Hu Gu Po, a tiger spirit who eats children to try to become human, Daughter grows a tiger tail and develops powers she doesn't understand or know how to use.[5] In a review for The New York Times, Amil Niazi contrasts Bestiary with immigrant literature organized around nostalgia and other sentimentality: instead, Bestiary is "full of magic realism that reaches down your throat, grabs hold of your guts and forces a slow reckoning with what it means to be a foreigner, a native, a mother, a daughter — and all the things in between."[15] In a review for the Star Tribune, May-Lee Chai says Chang’s novel “reinvents the genres of immigrant novel, queer coming-of-age story, and mother-and-daughter tale.”[16]

Bone House (2021)

In 2021, Chang's micro-chapbook Bone House was released by Bull City Press as part of their Inch series.[17] The collection functions as a queer Taiwanese-American retelling of Wuthering Heights, in which an unnamed narrator moves into a butcher's mansion "with a life of its own."[18]

Other work

Chang’s poetry was included in the 2019 Pushcart Anthology.[19] She has a short-story collection entitled Gods of Want forthcoming from One World,[20] which won the 2023 Lambda Literary Award for Lesbian Fiction.[1][2]

Honors

In 2018, Chang was named a Gregory Djanikian Scholar in Poetry by The Adroit Journal.[21] She has also been a Kundiman Fellow.[22] In 2019, Chang was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in the lesbian poetry category for her collection Past Lives, Future Bodies.[23] In 2020, she was awarded the National Book Foundation's "5 Under 35" prize (selected by previous honoree Justin Torres).[24] In 2021, her novel Bestiary was long-listed for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction[25] and the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize.[26]

References

  1. 1 2 "2023 Winners". Lambda Literary. Retrieved 2023-06-10.
  2. 1 2 Schaub, Michael (2023-06-12). "2023 Lambda Literary Award Winners Are Revealed". Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved 2023-06-13.
  3. ↑ "K-Ming Chang". National Book Foundation. Archived from the original on 2021-01-23. Retrieved 2021-02-11.
  4. 1 2 3 Chan, Vanessa (2020-09-30). "Completely Embodied: Talking with K-Ming Chang". The Rumpus. Archived from the original on 2020-12-18. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  5. 1 2 3 Khan, Saira (2020-10-01). "K-Ming Chang's "Bestiary": A Debut Novel in Which Mythology Is Real and a Girl Turns Into a Tiger". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Archived from the original on 2020-11-16. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  6. ↑ "K-Ming Chang". The Offing. Archived from the original on 2020-10-29. Retrieved 2021-02-04.
  7. ↑ Womer, Brenna (2019-03-08). "K-Ming Chang's "Past Lives, Future Bodies" reviewed by Brenna Womer". Tarpaulin Sky Magazine. Archived from the original on 2020-10-24. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  8. ↑ "Review of Past Lives, Future Bodies by K-Ming Chang". Ember Chasm Review. 2020-07-02. Archived from the original on 2020-12-19. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  9. 1 2 Flynn-Goodlett, Luiza (8 April 2019). "I Identify Sexually as Alive: A Review of K-Ming Chang's 'Past Lives, Future Bodies'". The Adroit Journal. Archived from the original on 1 October 2020. Retrieved 2 February 2021.
  10. ↑ Lau, Travis Chi Wing. "Past Lives Future Bodies". Up the Staircase Quarterly. Archived from the original on 26 September 2020. Retrieved 2 February 2021.
  11. ↑ Greathouse, Torrin A. (2018-11-02). "A Thin-Bladed Grace: K-Ming Chang's Past Lives, Future Bodies". The Rumpus. Archived from the original on 2020-12-18. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  12. ↑ Patrick, Bethann (2020-10-01). "Review: 'Bestiary,' an immigrant tale that puts the (filthy, brutal) realism in magical realism". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on January 17, 2021. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  13. ↑ Varno, David (July 10, 2020). "Writers to Watch Fall 2020". Publishers Weekly. Archived from the original on 2021-01-24. Retrieved 2021-02-10.
  14. ↑ Masad, Ilana (September 30, 2020). "This 'Bestiary' Lives In A Family's Multigenerational Stories". NPR.org. Archived from the original on 2021-01-28. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  15. ↑ Niazi, Amil (2020-09-29). "'Bestiary' Offers a Compendium of Creatures, and Generations". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on 2021-01-17. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  16. ↑ Chai, May-Lee (October 23, 2020). "Review: 'Bestiary,' by K-Ming Chang". Star Tribune. Archived from the original on 2020-12-31. Retrieved 2021-02-11.
  17. ↑ "Bone House". Bull City Press. Archived from the original on 2021-11-16. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  18. ↑ "K-Ming Chang". K-Ming Chang. Archived from the original on 2021-11-16. Retrieved 2021-11-15.
  19. ↑ "K-Ming Chang". Literary Hub. Archived from the original on 2020-12-04. Retrieved 2021-02-11.
  20. ↑ "Gods of Want". K-Ming Chang. Archived from the original on 2022-01-24. Retrieved 2021-02-11.
  21. ↑ Laberge, Peter (2018-03-22). "Announcing The Adroit Journal's 2018 Djanikian Scholars!". The Adroit Journal. Archived from the original on 2020-11-29. Retrieved 2021-02-04.
  22. ↑ Eaker, Alex (September 12, 2020). "Bestiary Poetically Raises a Coming-of-Age Tale to the Level of Myth". Slant Magazine. Archived from the original on 2021-02-06. Retrieved 2021-02-11.
  23. ↑ "The 2019 Lambda Literary Award Finalists Are Hereby Announced by Harriet Staff". Poetry Foundation. 2021-02-03. Archived from the original on 2021-02-04. Retrieved 2021-02-04.
  24. ↑ "The National Book Foundation Announces 2020 5 Under 35 Honorees". National Book Foundation. 2020-09-21. Archived from the original on 2021-01-16. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  25. ↑ Liaw, Amanda (February 2, 2021). "Announcing the longlist for the 2021 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction". The PEN/Faulkner Foundation. Archived from the original on 2021-02-04. Retrieved 2021-02-02.
  26. ↑ "2020 First Novel Prize: The Long List". The Center for Fiction. Archived from the original on 2021-02-27. Retrieved 2021-02-10.
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