num_pages: 304
description: In this jaw-dropping darkly comedic memoir a young woman comes of age in a dysfunctional Asian family whose members blamed their woes on ghosts and demons when in fact they should have been on anti-psychotic meds.Lindsay Wong grew up with a paranoid schizophrenic grandmother and a mother who was deeply afraid of the woo-woo--Chinese ghosts who come to visit in times of personal turmoil. From a young age she witnessed the woo-woo's sinister effects; at the age of six she found herself living in the food court of her suburban mall which her mother saw as a safe haven because they could hide there from dead people and on a camping trip her mother tried to light Lindsay's foot on fire to rid her of the woo-woo.The eccentricities take a dark turn however when her aunt suffering from a psychotic breakdown holds the city of Vancouver hostage for eight hours when she threatens to jump off a bridge. And when Lindsay herself starts to experience symptoms of the woo-woo herself she wonders whether she will suffer the same fate as her family.On one hand a witty and touching memoir about the Asian immigrant experience and on the other a harrowing and honest depiction of the vagaries of mental illness The Woo-Woo is a gut-wrenching and beguiling manual for surviving family and oneself.
language: English
title: The Woo-Woo: How I Survived Ice Hockey, Drug Raids, Demons, and My Crazy Chinese Family
publisher: Arsenal Pulp Press