Eat Bitter, Anastasia (A Novel)

A vibrant, bighearted coming-of-age story about a young woman caught between loving and leaving Oakland—the whiplash between trauma, dreams, and all the things that shape us below the surface.

Anastasia Ān Xiá Huang is the third generation of her family to live in Oakland, but now, in her twenties, she feels stuck in the city she loves. She assists a pretentious curator at a modern art museum, while her own artistic dreams have fallen to the wayside. When her beloved uncle passes away, she unexpectedly inherits his house, a rundown Victorian in Oakland Chinatown. At first, it seems like a bittersweet windfall: She can renovate the house with her best friend, Noa, and then sell it. That, combined with the bonus she’s been promised by her boss for locating a mysterious street artist, would give her the push she needs to apply to art school.

But the house itself seems to hold darkness. Not just the black mold on the ceiling, not just grief, but maybe something more, connected to the memories coming back to her with more force and frequency—of Anastasia’s childhood, the volatile father who abandoned her when she was five, the workaholic mother who continues to keep her distance.

Along with her wisecracking best friend, a resurfaced childhood crush, and an irrepressible elderly neighbor, Anastasia attempts to solve the interconnected riddles of her family, her home, and her art. Full of wonder, self-discovery, and bracing revelations, Eat Bitter, Anastasia is a colorful ode to the spirit of Oakland and a deeply intimate, surprising story about how the places and people we love contain so much more than meets the eye.