Life can sure be dangerous

Welcome to the world of the Lums of Orange County, three generations of deadpan hilarious Chinese Americans, in a penetrating first novel by 29-year-old Westminster resident Chieh Chieng. “A Long Stay in a Distant Land” incites laughter even as it ponders the grief of death, the desire for revenge and the push-pull of family relations. The Lums are under a curse, according to Louis Lum, 23-year-old member of that third generation. A number of family members have died prematurely. Louis’ mother, Mirla, the most recent victim, was killed in a car accident when Hersey Collins, a first-year resident at UCI Medical Center, fell asleep at the wheel after a 48-hour shift. Louis’ father, Sonny, calls Louis regularly, threatening to kill Hersey. “I’m driving to his house,” his father reports at 1 a.m. one night. “I have a knife. I’m going to stab him in the heart.” Louis moves in with his father to keep an eye on the “Old Man” (who, thanks to Louis’ poor grasp of Cantonese, he’s been calling the “Old Bean” for years without realizing his error).

Mirla’s death comes on the heels of 14 years of bad luck: Grandpa Melvin, a GI during World War II who was inspired to acts of bravery by Popeye cartoons, was crossing the street when he was struck and killed by an ice cream truck. Uncle Larry fell off a cliff while skiing in Mammoth; 12-year-old cousin Connie died from E. coli poisoning after eating a tainted bacon cheeseburger; Aunt Julie in Hong Kong died at 29 from cancer; and cousin Will succumbed to heatstroke during high school football practice. Louis attributes the string of deaths to Grandpa Melvin, whose war service violated the fundamental law that one should not kill another.

Chieng’s stories weave back and forth in time, and throughout there’s the pull toward the ways of the old country. Uncle Bo, as a child, refuses to use bowls and chopsticks, arguing that a plate and fork are more efficient. His father, Melvin, waxes poetic on how chopsticks and communal bowls allow the “[f]reedom to choose what I eat, constantly adjusting the ratio of meat to vegetable instead of having it all smashed together on a plate. What if I’m feeling meaty?

Louis tries to find the right balance between cultures. Along the way, he discovers that his father has developed a taste for malt liquor and is enamored with gangsta rap. Late in the novel, Sonny confronts his sworn enemy, Hersey Collins, who is black, and ends up giving him his prized copy of the “Straight Outta Compton” album.

“ ‘This is about your culture,’ Sonny said. ‘Your roots.’

“Hersey looked unconvinced.

“ ‘The struggle for equality and respect,’ Sonny said. ‘You know what I’m saying?’

“ ‘I grew up in Costa Mesa.’ ”

This play between who we are by genetics and family ties, against who we become by virtue of where and how we live, makes for a novel that addresses large issues even while we laugh at arguments about chopsticks.

Uncle Bo, who had moved to Hong Kong where he lived with wife Julie, has cut off almost all contact with his family after she dies. His mother, Esther, has been reduced to sending check-off forms with questions such as “Are you sick?” and “Do you have a job?” When the monthly forms stop being returned, Esther fears another Lum, her youngest and favorite son, may be the next victim of the family’s bad luck.

Louis decides to go to Hong Kong to search for Uncle Bo, and it is there he tastes genuine turnip cakes -- they’re delicious and taste nothing like the bricks Esther makes for family gatherings -- and gathers together the strands of the twisted and twined, delightfully funny and tragically real family story. Chieng’s take on life is humor in its most visceral form: informed by suffering and loss, at once side-splitting and sincere.

*

Bernadette Murphy is a regular contributor to Book Review and the author of “Zen and the Art of Knitting.”