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Chapters
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Chapters
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The Joy Luck Club has 20 chapters.
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Chapters20 items
The Joy Luck Club
Jing-mei 'June' Woo has just taken her late mother Suyuan's seat at the mah jong table. The other three mothers explain that Suyuan started the Joy Luck Club in Kweilin during the…
Scar
An-mei Hsu, as a child, was forbidden to speak her mother's name. Her mother had become a disgrace after leaving the family to become a rich man's concubine.
The Red Candle
Lindo Jong tells how she was promised in marriage as a small child and sent to live with her future in-laws as a servant-like figure for years before the wedding.
The Moon Lady
Ying-ying St. Clair recalls a Moon Festival outing from her childhood in China.
Rules of the Game
Waverly Jong learns chess from a set she gets at a Christmas charity event and quickly becomes obsessed. She teaches herself strategy by reading library books and practicing const…
The Voice from the Wall
Lena St. Clair narrates her childhood in a household shaped by her mother Ying-ying's depression and her father's well-meaning but clueless optimism.
Half and Half
Rose Hsu Jordan tells two stories that mirror each other. In the present, her marriage to Ted is falling apart and he wants a divorce.
Two Kinds
Jing-mei Woo narrates her mother Suyuan's obsession with making her a child prodigy. Suyuan pushes Jing-mei through a series of talent tests, eventually landing on piano lessons w…
Rice Husband
Lena St. Clair, now an adult, is married to Harold, her business partner.
Four Directions
Waverly Jong brings her fiancé Rich to meet her mother Lindo, and the dinner goes badly. Rich breaks every unspoken rule of Chinese etiquette without knowing it.
Without Wood
Rose Hsu Jordan tells her mother An-mei that she and Ted are divorcing. Rose has spent years being passive, letting Ted make all the decisions in their marriage, and she has becom…
Best Quality
Jing-mei Woo narrates a New Year's crab dinner her mother Suyuan hosted before she died. Suyuan let each guest pick a crab from the batch, and Jing-mei noticed her mother took the…
Magpies
An-mei Hsu tells the story of her mother, who became a concubine to a wealthy man named Wu Tsing after being widowed.
Waiting Between the Trees
Ying-ying St. Clair speaks, and for the first time the reader gets her full story.
American Translation
This short interlude chapter features two brief vignettes told by unnamed mothers and daughters. In the first, a mother warns her daughter not to put a mirror at the foot of the b…
Queen Mother of the Western Skies
Ying-ying St. Clair tells her granddaughter a story about a foolish queen who gave away her own spirit trying to please others.
A Pair of Tickets
This chapter and chapter 20 share the same title and are the same story told in full. Jing-mei travels with her father Canning Woo to China to meet the twin half-sisters her mothe…
Double Face
Lindo Jong reflects on her own double identity as she sits in a beauty salon with her daughter Waverly before Waverly's wedding trip to China.
Lena's Story
This chapter is actually titled 'Rice Husband' in the novel's original structure, but in this batch it is listed as 'Lena's Story.' Lena St.
Jing-mei Woo: A Pair of Tickets
This entry covers the full concluding chapter under Jing-mei's name. The novel ends with Jing-mei and her father arriving in Shanghai, meeting relatives, and then traveling to Gua…
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