Associated Press
Review: Searching for belonging in ‘Central Places’
Delia Cai’s debut novel has all the trappings of a breezy rom-com: Audrey, a successful 27-year-old New Yorker with a glamorous job in ad sales and handsome photojournalist fiancé, returns home to the Midwest to be confronted with old tensions with family and friends she thought she’d left in her past — including an unrequited high school crush. At the heart of the novel is the complicated relationship Audrey has with her mother, who left behind everything she had in China when Audrey’s father was accepted to a U.S. graduate school, and then gave up dreams of a career when Audrey was born. Adult Audrey realizes how hard that must have been, but at home she still falls back into old childhood patterns of bristling at her mother’s disapproving asides and hyper-criticalness whenever they’re in the same room.
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