Walk Without Notice

Ying and Chan, siblings and fierce rivals, are growing up just as Mao Tse Tung takes over China. An arranged marriage to a Chinese man from America saves Ying from the horrors that follow. But life for Ying in Orem, Utah, is not easy. She is torn between the need to support her husband and children and the desire to help her extended family in China.

When her husband is killed in a car accident, Ying finds herself alone in a strange land to raise her children. Through her ingenuity and strong work ethic, she gets by, and over time she finds fulfillment in the family she is rearing. Back home, Chan has enough grit and anger to survive the reeducation and work camps run by the Communists. With Ying’s help, he escapes China and comes to America. Still, he cannot help but resent Ying, nor can he forgive his extended family that lived off him in China. He believes, as well, that his family has stolen from him his inheritance—the family jade stones that his mother kept. He refuses to help his extended family come to America.

Little does Chan know that, years before, Ying’s mother gave her the family stones, a prize she has kept secret for years because of her love and longing for her mother. Seeing no other way to unite their family in America, Ying heads to New York to see Chan, the stones in hand.

K. Mei Li Inouye grew up in Gunnison, UT and is a graduate of Brigham Young University. She majored in English and Chinese. While studying journalism in China, she wrote "Living and Loving India" and "Tell It Like It Is" for Dongfang magazine as well as "Squatter Heaven" for Yangtze Evening Post. Her short story, "Coming from China," has won first place in Brigham Young University’s Anne Doty Fiction Contest, undergraduate division, and is included in Brigham Young University’s creative writing magazine, Inscape. She will be earning a creative writing MFA from Hollins University in Virginia this fall. Walk Without Notice is her first novel.