Amy Tan

Amy Tan was born in Oakland, California in 1952. Both of her parents were immigrants from China. Her father died when she was a child and the family moved to Switzerland for a time.

Tan´s mother wanted her to become a doctor but Tan left her pre-med course in order to study English and Linguistics at San Jose State University. She also studied for a doctorate in Linguistics, first at the University of California at Santa Cruz and later at Berkeley.
Although Tan later prospered as a business writer, she did not find fulfillment in her career. She began to study jazz piano as a counterpoint to long work hours. She also began to write fiction and soon found an agent.

Just as she was embarking on this new career, Tan’s mother fell ill. Tan promised herself that if her mother recovered, she would take her to China, to see the daughter who had been left behind almost forty years before. The trip was a revelation for Tan. It gave her a new perspective on the difficult relationship with her mother, and inspired her to complete the book of stories she had been working on. These stories became her first novel, The Joy Luck Club, which she dedicated to her mother.

Upon its publication in 1989, Tan’s book won enthusiastic reviews and spent eight months on the New York Times best-seller list. Her subsequent novel, The Kitchen God’s Wife (1991) confirmed her reputation. Since then Amy Tan has published two books for children, The Moon Lady and The Chinese Siamese Cat and two novels The Hundred Secret Senses (1995) and The Bonesetter’s Daughter (2001). The Opposite of Fate: A Book of Musings, appeared in 2003.