Patricia Park's new YA novel captures the complexities of race and adolescence

NPR's Book of the Day

NPR

Arts, Books

4.2 • 671 Ratings

🗓️ 29 November 2023

⏱️ 10 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Imposter Syndrome and Other Confessions of Alejandra Kim follows a Korean-Argentinian teen's journey to understanding who she is. Through the comfort of her multicultural home in Queens to the hallways of her ultra-woke, elite prep school in Manhattan, Alejandra grapples with academics, the politics of school lunch, and even a microaggression from her own teacher. As author Patricia Park tells Here & Now's Robin Young, it's a story about how quickly the world is changing – and how conversations about race are, or aren't, keeping up.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's NPR's book today. I'm Andrew Limbaugh. The word performative gets used a lot in today's
0:08.4	interview. It's with Patricia Park, author of the YA book, Imposter Syndrome, and other confessions of
0:13.8	Alejandra Kim. And it's about this teenager, Ale, navigating her fancy high school's world of
0:19.4	microaggressions and allyship and race and identity, well, you know, just trying to get fancy high school's world of microaggressions and allyship and race and identity,
0:23.1	well, you know, just trying to get through high school and get into college.
0:26.4	It's one of NPR's books we love this year, and Patricia Park talked to here and now as Robin Young
0:30.8	about the negotiations Alley has to make during every single social interaction.
0:37.0	That's ahead.
0:38.8	Many young people today are navigating a brave new world
0:42.0	with gender, non-conforming bathrooms,
0:44.5	an alphabet soup of respect, LGBTQ, Bipak,
0:48.5	black indigenous, or people of color,
0:50.8	Latinx, oops, your best friend prefers Latino.
0:55.7	Oh, have we got a book for them?
1:00.6	Hilarious, heartbreaking, accepting. It's from Patricia Park, who made a splash with her 2015 debut novel, Re-Jane. Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre set around a Korean-American orphan
1:06.6	from Queens. Our interview is at here now.org. Her new book for young adults and older ones,
1:11.8	too, is also set in Queens. Imposter Syndrome and other confessions of Alejandra Kim. It centers
1:18.3	around high school senior Alejandra or Ali, the daughter of Argentine-Korean immigrant parents,
1:24.9	who faces expectations that her origin story will make her like a
1:28.7	Marvel comic book superhero, or cause teachers to stare at her like she's a typo on the
1:34.0	attendance sheet. What? What are you? The teachers are at an elite Quaker prep school in Manhattan,
1:40.3	where Alejandro tries to keep her head down, blend in with mostly white classmates.
	...

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