She too, struggles with a duality, trying to meld her past self with the woman and the life she has now. I don’t think it’s rocket science to conclude that Deming/Daniel’s unrest, his inability to settle in and focus is wrapped up in his lack of closure concerning his mother, and his struggle with the two sides of him, with his peace of mind remaining elusive.īut, by the second part of the story, I began to understand there was more going on that what appears on the surface, shifting the focus onto the broken immigration system, giving Polly a chance to tell her side of the story.
He struggles to adapt to his new life, bowing under pressure, developing a gambling problem, but finding relief through music.
In this case, Deming never knew his father, so his mother was his whole world. There are many books about mothers and daughters, a relationship often fraught with various juxtapositions, but a bond between a mother and her son, is something we should explore and cheer on more often. Had she simply abandoned him or did something terrible happen to her? But, all the while, his mother’s fate haunts him. However, he does end up in a good home, with Kay and Peter, an educated couple who try their best to offer him a better life.Īfter his adoption, Kay and Peter change his name to Daniel, completing his transformation into their environment. With no blood relatives, Deming finds himself at the mercy of Vivian, who says she can’t afford to keep him. But, one day, after an argument, Polly leaves for work and disappears. Polly immigrates to the US from China and is raising her young son Deming, living with her boyfriend, Leon, his sister, Vivian, and her son, Michael. The Leavers by Lisa Ko is a 2017 Algonquin Books publication. This powerful debut is the winner of the 2016 PEN/Bellwether Prize for fiction, awarded by Barbara Kingsolver for a novel that addresses issues of social justice. It’s the story of how one boy comes into his own when everything he’s loved has been taken away-and how a mother learns to live with the mistakes of her past. Set in New York and China, The Leavers is a vivid and moving examination of borders and belonging. They rename him Daniel Wilkinson in their efforts to make him over into their version of an “all-American boy.” But far away from all he’s ever known, Daniel struggles to reconcile his new life with his mother’s disappearance and the memories of the family and community he left behind. He is eventually adopted by two white college professors who move him from the Bronx to a small town upstate.
With his mother gone, eleven-year-old Deming is left with no one to care for him. One morning, Deming Guo’s mother, an undocumented Chinese immigrant named Polly, goes to her job at the nail salon and never comes home.
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