by Katie Yee
First published 2025
The narrator sits across from her husband at a restaurant, anticipating samosas and pleasant conversation. Instead, she learns he's been sleeping with someone named Maggie. Soon after, chest pain sends her to the doctor, where she receives another blow: breast cancer. She names the tumor Maggie too. Over the following months, she talks directly to Maggie the tumor, treating this unwelcome guest as a companion in her body. She writes an elaborate manual about her ex-husband's habits and preferences, gifting it to Maggie the other woman with surprising generosity. At bedtime, she tells her children stories rooted in Chinese folklore her own mother once shared, hoping to strengthen their cultural connection while finding her own path forward. Through fragments of daily life, doctor visits, and quiet moments with her kids, she transforms betrayal and illness into something unexpectedly funny and fierce.
Genres: literary-fiction, humor, contemporary, adult-fiction, family-drama
Vibes: darkly-humorous, fierce, intimate, poignant, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, personification, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Restaurant, Doctor's office
Period: Contemporary
208 pages · Paperback · S&S/Summit Books
Content warnings: medical-trauma, terminal-illness
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