'Captivating from the first sentence' Woman and Home

'Vivid and precise, deliciously cool-eyed, immensely readable' Jonathan Franzen

'Evokes the narrative power of classic Anne Tyler' Janice Y.K. Lee, author of The Piano Teacher

'I loved this novel and its heroine so much. A must-read' J. Courtney Sullivan, author of The Cliffs

Joan Liang's life is a series of surprising developments: she never thought she would leave Taiwan (and for all places, California), nor did she expect her first marriage to implode - especially as quickly and spectacularly as it did. She definitely did not expect to fall in love with an older, wealthy American and become his fourth wife and mother to his youngest children. Through all this she asks herself the question familiar to so many of us: what are we living for? And are we ever truly satisfied?

Vivid, comic and intensely moving, The Satisfaction Café is a novel about all of the joy, sorrow, betrayal and beauty that come with marriage and family - and above all, about life's endless capacity to surprise us.

"Captivating from the first sentence ... a beautiful character study spanning an entire life while navigating the joys, sorrow and surprises that life can throw our way" - Woman and Home

"Subtle, surprising, and elegantly constructed, The Satisfaction Cafe is an insightful and funny exploration of how seldom our choices feel like choices; how rare and elusive the idea of home can feel" - Lynn Steger Strong, author of Flight

"Kathy Wang's quietly pitched but engaging character study [has] a cool, crystalline, lightly witty detachment ... One for fans of Ann Patchett and Anne Tyler" - The Times