First Impression Friday will be a meme where you talk about a book that you JUST STARTED! Maybe you’re only a chapter or two in, maybe a little farther. Based on this sampling of your current read, give a few impressions and predict what you’ll think by the end.

Synopsis:

It’s the eve of Rachel Chu’s wedding, and she should be over the moon. She has a flawless oval-cut diamond, a wedding dress she loves, and a fiancé willing to thwart his meddling relatives and give up one of the biggest fortunes in Asia in order to marry her. Still, Rachel mourns the fact that her birth father, a man she never knew, won’t be there to walk her down the aisle.

Then a chance accident reveals his identity. Suddenly, Rachel is drawn into a dizzying world of Shanghai splendor, a world where people attend church in a penthouse, where exotic cars race down the boulevard, and where people aren’t just crazy rich… they’re China rich.

It’s the end of the workweek—yay! I hope the week has been kind to everyone, although the previous week was quite hectic for me personally. I am still trying to resolve a lot of issues, but more keep floating to the surface. Still, I can’t believe how time flies! We are already halfway through the seventh month of the year. Time takes its natural course. Nevertheless, I hope the first half of the year has been promising. As the year progresses, I hope everyone is given plenty of opportunities to grow and improve. With the weekend here, I hope everyone has a great one. It’s time to dress down and spend it either resting from the rigors of a demanding career, pursuing your passions, completing household chores, spending time with loved ones, or simply relaxing. It is going to be a damp weekend here in the Philippines. I sure hope that the super typhoon currently on track toward Taiwan weakens. I hope you’re all doing well—physically, mentally, and emotionally.

Following four months of venturing into the works of European literature, I was finally able to conclude the journey, which I originally planned to be just two months. It was just enough time to complete all the works by European writers in my reading challenges. Ironically, it was these books that ultimately extended my literary adventure into a four-month journey. With my European literary adventure this year officially complete—the longest I have spent in European literary territory in a single year—I have commenced a new literary journey. With July being my birth month, I have decided to embark on a literary adventure into a literary territory that is closer to home: Asian literature. Apart from being part of the region, I have often dedicated July to the works of Japanese writers; Japanese literature is one of my favorite literary traditions in the world. I actually commenced this new literary journey with Mieko Kawakami’s latest translated novel, Sisters in Yellow.

With my insatiable appetite for Japanese literature, I have actually run out of books by Japanese writers, at least those on my bookshelf. Still, there are a few waiting to be read, and there are others that I am looking forward to. I am quite excited by the news of Haruki Murakami’s latest novel. I am looking forward to its English translation, as it promises to offer a different dimension of Murakami’s prose. My current read, however, is not a work by a Japanese writer. Singaporean writer Kevin Kwan made headlines with his novel, Crazy Rich Asians, a satire of the upper crust of Singaporean, and by extension, Asian society. I have read the book back in 2019. It was a light and fun read, riddled with some moments of tenderness as Kwan exposes the hypocrisy that permeates high society. While I finished the first book, I did not plan to read the rest of the trilogy, not after a couple of years later. Seven years after reading the first book in the trilogy, I am finally continuing this literary journey with its sequel, China Rich Girlfriend.

Originally published in 2015, China Rich Girlfriend picks up where its predecessor concluded. The novel, however, opens with a newspaper article about a terrible wreck involving a Ferrari in London. The accident involved Carlton Bao, the only son of very wealthy Mainland Chinese parents, who was studying in the United Kingdom. Carlton and another girl were badly injured when the car crashed into an expensive shop. Following the news of the accident, Carlton’s mother, Shaoyen Bao hurried to London, along with her banker. Apparently, a third girl was with Carlton during the accident. Unfortunately, she perished and Shaoyen and her banker traveled to London to pay hush money. Her banker is Edison Cheng, a financial consultant in Hong Kong. During her trip to London, Shaoyen met the formidable Eleanor Young, the domineering mother of Nicholas “Nick” Young, and some of her friends. Readers of the first book, of course, would immediately recognize Eleanor and her son.

Over the course of their lunch meeting, Shaoyen showed Eleanor a picture of her son. Eleanor, the aunt of Edison, immediately noticed the resemblance between Carlton and Rachel Chu, the woman engaged to marry Nick. Nick and Eleanor’s relationship has soured after Eleanor attempted to break her son’s relationship with Rachel. Three years earlier, Nick, an NYU history professor, introduced Rachel to the rest of her family. It did not go as planned. Eleanor insisted that her son could not marry a woman who never knew her father and was raised by a single mother with no family name. For the uber-rich like the Youngs, Rachel was beneath them as her family had neither wealth nor social position. Shang Su Yi, Nick’s grandmother, also opposed the marriage. Since the events of three years ago, Nick and Rachel have repaired their relationship and have since lived in Manhattan, away from the expectations and prying eyes of Nick’s family. Shang Su YI’s goddaughter, Jacqueline Ling, however, visited New York to try to convince Nick to reconcile with his grandmother.

Nick, however, was adamant. He was willing to give up his inheritance to live in New York with the woman he loved and a job he enjoyed. As the story moves forward, we again meet familiar characters, such as Nick’s cousin, Astrid Leong; she was one of the more vibrant and memorable characters in the first book, although she had her own fair share of heartaches. She has since reunited with her husband, Michael. Their marriage has stabilized financially after Michael’s tech company earned a modicum of success. Along with this financial success, Astrid’s family finally started to respect Michael. However, there was a secret to Michael’s success. Apparently, Charlie Wu, Astrid’s onetime fiancé, secretly engineered the success of Michael’s firm in order to make Astrid happy. However, Charlie was struggling in his marriage with Isabel. Along with the old characters are new ones, such as Kitty Pong, the former actress whose marriage to Bernard Tai brought her into the Singapore elite. She tried to buy her way into the high society of Hong Kong by appearing in gossip magazines and buying high-profile art.

Interestingly, China Rich Girlfriend is a 180-degree flip from the book I featured in my previous First Impression Friday update. While I was not planning on reading the novel, I guess my mind wanted to get distracted by wanting to read something easier and lighter, something that would elicit some laughs after reading some emotionally heavy novels. Kwan’s depiction of Asian high society is laced with cynicism. He is unfiltered in exposing the hypocrisy that reverberates throughout. This is a theme he already explored in Crazy Rich Asians. I am expecting he will delve into even deeper in the second book of the trilogy. There are secrets, it seems, that will slowly be unveiled as the story progresses. However, I am looking forward to how the wedding of Nick and Rachel will unfold. So far, I have been reading how their plans for their wedding are unfolding. I guess it will be the novel’s pièce de résistance. I am expecting that the wedding is going to be one brimming with comedic scenes, although I am looking forward to some moments of tenderness. Will Eleanor’s steely facade finally be softened?

The novel is a fairly quick read, and I should be able to finish it over the weekend. How about you, fellow reader? What book or books are you taking with you this weekend? I certainly hope you enjoy them. For now, I hope everyone has a great and restful weekend!