Reading Group Center




Beautiful Country Book Club Kit

“Incredibly important, exquisitely written, harrowing. . .  It is not only Wang’s mastery of the language that makes the story so compelling, but also the passionate yearning for empathy and understanding.” —Shondaland

We invite you and your book club to travel back to the 1990s with Qian Julie Wang’s Beautiful Country. In this intimate memoir, Qian Julie channels her younger self as she arrives in America at the age of seven and spends her childhood as an undocumented immigrant, living in fear of being discovered. Along with the challenges of poverty and not speaking the language, young Qian finds joy in simple pleasures: her first taste of pizza, the Christmas lights on 5th Avenue, teaching herself to read. Most importantly, she never stops dreaming of a better future, continually seeking the light in a life in the shadows.

Whether Qian Julie’s story is something you never could have imagined going through, or you are finally seeing part of your own experience represented on the page, this is a memoir that will stick with you for a long time, and we can’t wait for you to dig in even deeper with our Book Club Kit. Inside you’ll find a letter from the author, a Q&A, discussion questions, suggestions for further reading, two mouth-watering recipes, and a playlist that is sure to feed your 90s nostalgia.

To download a PDF of the book club kit, click  here or on the image below.