EPISODE 672 - Karin K Jensen - The Strength of Water - An Asian American Coming of Age Memoir

The Sibylline Press edition of The Strength of Water, An Asian American Coming of Age Memoir, is scheduled for release on November 7, 2025! It is available for review on NetGalley and Booksprout. Pre-order on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and wherever books are sold.

In 1920s Detroit, King Ying stands on a box to iron clothes in her parents’ laundry business, endures taunts of Ching-Ching Chinaman on the playground, and tries to reconcile what passes for normal in Jazz-Age America with her father’s vastly different cultural values.

She dreams of a home, the elegance of her Jane Arden paper dolls, and winning her stern father’s affection. But when Ba incurs steep debts during the Great Depression, he sends her far from hope to his ancestral village.

In remote Tai Ting Pong, in the Guangdong Province of China, she feels as foreign in the land of her heritage as in the country of her birth. She must survive hunger, dangerous superstitions, and Japanese invasion as the Sino-Japanese War begins.

When guardian angels help her return to the U.S., it’s a chance to seize her American dream.

In this inspiring and heartfelt memoir, Karin K. Jensen records her mother’s transpacific quest for identity, survival, and new world dreams. The Strength of Water received a coveted starred Kirkus review and was included on Kirkus’s annual list of Top 100 Indie Books.

Book club discussion questions are included at the end of the book. Invite the author to your book club discussion!

From the Author

The Strength of Water is my mother’s memoir, as told to me, starting in the 1920s and spanning nearly a century. It offers exquisite period details of immigrant life in the U.S. and village life in China.

One woman’s epic odyssey, one family’s story of striving in a foreign country, one generation’s unique memory. An amazing memoir where the “strength of water,” the power of resilience and adapting to any circumstance, is the common thread that flows through the whole family, connecting everyone’s lives. Touching, inspiring, and brilliantly written.

Shen Yang, Author of More Than One Child

Throughout my childhood, my mother told stories of growing up in her father’s Detroit laundry business during the infancy of the automobile industry and later in a Cantonese village on the eve of the Sino-Japanese war. She also spoke of what it was like to survive as a live-in domestic worker and teen waitress in mid-century California.

The Strength of Water is a daughter’s careful excavation of her mother’s story; it is a mother’s disclosure of history, of trauma, of realities that mark not only her life but the legacy of her daughters’. This is a book written with tremendous love and authenticity. It is an important document of the Asian American experience.

Kao Kalia Yang, Award winning author of The Song Poet and The Latehomecomer

These stories felt like mythology, far removed from my experiences growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area, yet vital to preserve as history. When I decided to set them down, I could hear my mother’s voice so clearly that I wrote in the first person. Thank you for taking a look.

A classic, vividly written immigrant saga - Kirkus Reviews

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EPISODE 671 - David Wolfson - The underbelly of Wall Street - The story of a young idealistic college graduate starting out on Wall Street

What is the name of your book or books and where can it/they be found or purchased?

Financial Syndicate: Some Job Opportunities Go Too Far; Found on Amazon

What do you want readers to know about your book/s?

The reader will see a likable character with whom he or she can identify, along with identifying on how a small-town kid gets caught up in corporate intrigue.

What does being an author mean to you?

The ability to create my own characters and story, along with sharing it with the whole world.

How did your journey as an author begin?

Over a long weekend, I had a job interview in Chicago. On the trip home, my flight had a six-hour delay due to inclement weather. With a crowded airport terminal full of unhappy people in a similar situation, I plugged in my laptop and started typing. Through long commutes and long weekends, along with some late nights, the Financial Syndicate was born.

Who or what motivated you to write?

A college lit teacher, and from the above answer, the idea existed in my mind. However, during the long wait at O’Hare, I decided to put my idea to action.

What is your mission and or vision as an author?

To entertain, including making my reader chuckle or shed a tear, I also want to highlight an awareness of an issue not in the front pages of a newspaper or top of a newscast.

Do you only write in one genre or multiple? Please explain why or why not.

As of now, I am currently writing in mystery-suspense. However, in the future, I am looking at other genres such as historical fiction. Also, given that I am a diehard romantic, I would like to test the limits as a male romance fiction writer

Are there certain themes or topics that you cover as an author? What are they? Why these?

In the Financial Syndicate, I am looking at the issuance of toxic securities and fees earned from them. In my second book, I am covering contract employment. Also, I would like to write a book about the current political environment, specifically a short-sighted and attention-seeking President, hating institutional norms.

What do you want readers to know about you?

I am accessible, easy-going, and I will sit for hours talking to any reader and answering any question. I am really looking forward to bookstore tours, with readers talking to the person behind the book.

Instagram - @wolfsonauthor

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Episode 533 - Corinna Dunn - Note To Self - Lessons on Trauma and Thriving in its Aftermath

https://corinna-dunn.square.site/

Friday, May 02, 2025

Support the show

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https://livingthenextchapter.com/
podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/

Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!
https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca