But at the same time, John grew up without speaking Chinese, as an American ― did that mean he’d lost touch with himself, as these adoptive parents feared their child might? John’s parents, and now John and Nola themselves, struggle with what it means for a Chinese person to choose a white partner, with all the unsteady power dynamics that attend that interracial romance. Adopting a Chinese baby can’t be as simple, for the white couples John and Nola are with, as making sure the baby eats Chinese food. The cumulative trauma of so much bigotry, violence, and hate can’t be dropped with the ease that every character seems to want. Every past section in The Fortunes informs the one that follows, just as history informs the present, and this section is informed by all that has come before. The final section offers the most knotted questions of all, with a conflicted John, half-Chinese, adopting a Chinese baby with his white wife.
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