Through Jess, the will of the Black Water Sister has a conduit. Ah Ma is stubborn, acerbic, and determined to strike against a gang boss who offended her god. When she starts hearing the voice of her dead Ah Ma in her head, she finds herself unexpectedly sucked into a world of hungry ghosts and hungrier gods, who use humans-in some ways, the hungriest of all-to carry out their wishes. Jess is closeted, unemployed, and uncertain if she really wants to move to a country she left when she was a toddler. If this sounds exactly like the premise of Zen Cho’s Black Water Sister, that’s because it is. Don’t let anyone-especially not my parents, who have worked so hard and sacrificed so much-see how much it is killing me to be the one who holds all their expectations and dreams. Don’t let slip anything gay, least of all the person I dated in college. Don’t say anything on the thorny subject of my grandmother. Coming back to Malaysia-where kaypoh aunties with strong opinions about what is acceptable abound-always means taking a black marker to the ever-growing file of my life. I recently came back to Penang from America, a move between accents, languages, cultures, and names.
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