NOT YOUR CHINA DOLL The Wild and Shimmering Life of Anna May Wong

This audio biography doesn't shimmer as brightly as its subject, the wildly talented and stereotype-defying Chinese American actor Anna May Wong. The author narrates the preface slowly in a wooden tone. Caroline McLaughlin narrates the rest in a scratchy voice that evokes the tinny, high-pitched quality of audio recordings made during Wong's career apex in the early twentieth century. While the author deftly illustrates the inherent racism in Hollywood studio culture, she only scratches the surface of Wong's personal life. This results in an audiobook that sounds like a catalog of Wong's movies, their casts, and their plots. McLaughlin struggles to enliven the author's heavy reliance on quotations from film reviews to describe how audiences responded to Wong's many enigmatic performances. J.T. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine [Published: OCTOBER 2024]