Bookshop Santa Cruz and The Humanities Institute at UC Santa Cruz invite you to join us for a free online event with Karen Tei Yamashita who will celebrate her newest book, Sansei and Sensibility. Generations of Japanese Americans merge with Jane Austen’s characters in these lively stories, pairing uniquely American histories with reimagined classics.

This is a free event. Please consider purchasing the book through Bookshop Santa Cruz or make a donation to help support Bookshop Santa Cruz. Thank you!

“An elegantly written, wryly affectionate mashup of Jane Austen and the Japanese immigrant experience. . . . Yamashita’s reimagining of Austen is sympathetic and funny—and as on target as the movie Clueless.” —Kirkus, starred review

“Karen Tei Yamashita contends with the Western canon in this astute, pitch-perfect, and wryly funny short story collection. . . . A genuine pleasure to read.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review

“This hilarious new collection of stories and essays will make you chuckle, though underneath the humor is deft critique. Marie Kondo’s tidying up is juxtaposed with a tour of World War II internment camps. Sexist techno-orientalism and the meaning of Godzilla are reexamined. Local treasure, UCSC professor emerita, and acclaimed novelist Karen Tei Yamashita has written a book about the Japanese American experience both entertaining and vital in this era of anti-immigration politics.” —Jason, Bookshop Santa Cruz bookseller

Karen Tei Yamashita is the author of seven books, including I Hotel, finalist for the National Book Award, and most recently, Letters to Memory, all published by Coffee House Press. Recipient of the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature and a US Artists Ford Foundation Fellowship, she is Professor Emerita of Literature and Creative Writing at the University of California, Santa Cruz.