Tropic of Orange
Award History
| Award | Year | Status |
|---|---|---|
| National Book Foundation Distinguished Contribution to American Letters | 2021 | Winner |
About This Book
A visionary, formally dazzling novel set over seven days in Los Angeles involving seven interconnected characters. A magical orange found in Mexico begins to move the Tropic of Cancer northward, pulling the physical landscape of North America with it. Yamashita's extraordinary third novel interweaves magical realism, immigration, globalism, and the multicultural chaos of Los Angeles.
About the Author
Karen Tei Yamashita is an American author of Japanese descent whose fiction spans magical realism, political satire, and historical epic, bringing together Japanese American history, Brazilian immigration, and Los Angeles urban geography in dazzling and formally innovative narratives. Born in Oakland, California, in 1951, she spent nine years living in Brazil, an experience that deeply shaped her literary imagination. Yamashita's major novels include Brazil-Maru (1992), Through the Arc of the Rain Forest (1990), Tropic of Orange (1997)—widely considered her masterpiece—and I Hotel (2010), which was a finalist for the National Book Award and chronicles the Asian American movement in San Francisco in the 1960s and 1970s. Read more →
