The Center for Fiction Presents Jiaming Tang on Cinema Love with Vanessa Chan

Tuesday, 7:00 pm EDT May 7, 2024

The Center for Fiction
& Livestreamed

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The Center for Fiction is thrilled to welcome The Center for Fiction / Susan Kamil Emerging Writer Fellowship alumnus, Jiaming Tang, to celebrate his debut novel, Cinema Love. Tang’s novel follows Old Second and Bao Mei, a married couple in Chinatown with an unusual past. In their hometown of Fuzhao, Bao Mei worked at the Worker’s Cinema, a theater and safe space for gay men to find love. While Bao Mei sold tickets to closeted theatergoers, Old Second found intimacy under the backdrop of classic war films. After his secret relationship with his lover is revealed, the two set out towards an uncertain future as they emigrate to New York City. Spanning the course of several decades, Tang’s enrapturing story is a moving epic about queer love and forbidden relationships that is “not just an extraordinary debut, but a future classic” (Jessamine Chan, author of The School for Good Mothers). He is joined in conversation by Vanessa Chan, author of the national bestseller The Storm We Made. Tang and Chan will have a rousing discussion on his debut novel and its exploration of memory and the weight of secrets.

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In Conversation

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    Jiaming Tang

    Jiaming Tang

    Jiaming Tang is a queer immigrant writer. He holds an MFA from the University of Alabama, and his writing has appeared in such publications as AGNI, Literary Hub, Joyland magazine, and elsewhere. He is a 2022–2023 alumnus of The Center for Fiction / Susan Kamil Emerging Writer Fellowship and lives in Brooklyn, New York. Cinema Love is his first novel.


    Photo Credit: Dutton

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    Vanessa Chan

    Vanessa Chan

    Vanessa Chan is the Malaysian author of The Storm We Made (Marysue Rucci Books, January 2024), a national bestseller, Good Morning America Book Club Pick and BBC Radio 2 Book Club pick. Acquired by international publishers in a flurry of auctions, the novel, her first, will be published in more than twenty languages worldwide. Her other work has been published in Vogue, Esquire, and more. Vanessa grew up in Malaysia and is now based mostly in Brooklyn.


    Photo Credit: Mary Inhea Kang

Featured Book

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    Cinema Love

    By Jiaming Tang

    Published by Penguin

    PURCHASE

    For over thirty years, Old Second and Bao Mei have cobbled together a meager existence in New York City’s Chinatown. But unlike other couples, these two share an unusual past. In rural Fuzhou, before they emigrated, they frequented the Workers’ Cinema: a theater where gay men cruised for love.

    While classic war films played, Old Second and his countrymen found intimacy in the screening rooms. In the box office, Bao Mei sold movie tickets to closeted men, guarding their secrets and finding her own happiness with the projectionist. But when Old Second’s passion for his male lover is revealed, a series of haunting events unfold, propelling these characters toward an uncertain future in America.

    Spanning three timelines —post-socialist China, 1980s Chinatown, and contemporary New York— Cinema Love is an “exceptional” and “moving” (Alice Hoffman) epic about men and women who find themselves in forbidden relationships; the weight of secrets; and the way memory forever haunts the present.

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