Rice Room: Growing Up Chinese-American from Number Two Son Torock 'n' Roll

A leading entertainment journalist offers a poignant portrait of growing up Asian American, detailing his journey from alienation and the traditional world of his parents to assimilation and acceptance in the world of journalism. Tour.

As a writer and editor for Rolling Stone , Fong-Torres was both witness to and active participant in the late-'60s counterculture, whose penchant for casual sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll was epitomized by the hippie scene in his native San Francisco. As a first-generation Chinese American, Fong-Torres was torn between this alluring American lifestyle and the traditional cultural heritage his immigrant parents struggled fiercely to instill in their five children. His autobiography is peppered with colorful anecdotes about the early days at Rolling Stone and its flamboyant editor, Jann Wenner, but the memoir's chief interest is in its moving account of the author's attempt to negotiate a peaceable compromise between a son's enthusiasm for trendy culture and his parents' desire that he embrace antithetical Chinese traditions instead. Although he borders on the patronizing when discussing his romantic attachments, Fong-Torres redeems himself by demonstrating a broad knowledge of and sympathy for both Chinese and American traditions.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

A tender, sometimes funny memoir by a son of Chinese immigrants who became a writer and Rolling Stone editor. Fong-Torres (Hickory Wind, 1991) got his unusual name--``the greatest by-line in the world,'' one colleague said--from his father, who bought a Filipino birth certificate to circumvent immigration laws. Growing up in Oakland's Chinatown in the 1950s, the author and his siblings worked in the family restaurant (hence the title) and were sent to learn Chinese culture after school, ``but my heart was elsewhere.'' Mad magazine and Elvis Americanized him, and he became a high school writer and stage cut-up. At San Francisco State, he was a DJ and newspaperman, and found himself, in the midst of mid-60's turmoil. In between tales of his siblings and their attempts to leave the nest, Fong-Torres tells amusing, if somewhat overwrought, stories of his romantic struggles with Asian and non-Asian women. He got his Rolling Stone ``dream job'' shortly after it began in 1967 and also moonlighted on a Chinatown paper. Though Fong-Torres tells a few anecdotes about the likes of Janis Joplin and Ray Charles, he mostly skates over his rock experiences. Rather, he recounts the tragedy of older brother Barry, a youth worker killed in a 1972 Chinatown gang war, and his own effort to grow close to his reticent parents, interviewing them before his 1982 trip to China to work on a documentary. Fong-Torres concludes that his parents' Chinese ways actually produced hard-working, decent children. An enjoyable, thought-provoking tale of family ties and cultural identity, but rock 'n' roll fans may be frustrated by the author's emphases. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Fong-Torres' coming-of-age story traces his cross-cultural heritage as an Asian American desperately seeking hot dogs, chili, and assimilation. After beginning with his parents, who entered this country using false papers, his bittersweet book recalls a childhood often spent in the rice room behind his family's Chinese restaurant or in the restaurant itself, working--as did his siblings--in the family business while attending public school and also Chinese school, where the ancient art of calligraphy was painstakingly taught to children actually yearning for all things American. Although expected to earn high grades in all classes, assist his father in opening a new restaurant, and date Chinese girls rather than "foreign devils," second son Ben was drawn instead to Elvis Presley and the rock 'n' roll culture. Eventually, he passed high school, endured the untimely shooting death at 29 of his older brother, and went to work for Rolling Stone, chronicling rock culture. By his adroit account of it, his young life was full of hard work, cultural contradictions, and familial devotion as well as sadness, rebellion, and laughter. Whitney Scott

Fong-Torres, a founding editor of Rolling Stone , rose to fame as one of America's top rock and entertainment journalists through interviews with the likes of Bob Dylan and Ray Charles. With a professional sensitivity to conflicting issues, he describes the frustrations he felt growing up with a double identity--Chinese and American. The constant struggle between the urge to assimilate into the American mainstream and a strong sense of obligation to his parents and Chinese tradition gives ironic twists to his life, affecting his career in radio and journalism, his relationships with both Caucasian and Chinese women, and even his way of communicating with his parents. Unlike his journey through life, Fong-Torres's writing is smooth and right to the point. Under the bitter and regretful overtones lurk a good sense of humor and wit. Recommended for most collections.
- Mark Meng, St. John's Univ. Lib., New York
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.