Weddings and Wasabi (novella): Book 4 in the Sushi series

I enjoyed the humor, the spiritual insights, and the interactions between the various characters. The goats sure add to the humor!

I was a great fan of the previous books in this series:  Sushi for One? , Only Uni , and  Single Sashimi  so I was glad to hear that Camy Tang had finally written a book about the fourth cousin, Jennifer Lim, but I wondered. Since writing the first three, Ms. Tang had gone off in a different direction, creating an Asian-American Christian suspense romance novel series:  Deadly Intent , Formula for Danger , and  Stalker in the Shadows , also very enjoyable but an altogether different kind of writing. Could she recapture the screwball comedy lunacy of the first three novels in the Sushi Series?I needn't have worried. At the end of chapter 1, Jenn, the "good" cousin is thinking, "Sure, she knew him. Knew the next time he came for his goat she'd ram her chef's knife, Michael Meyers style, right between his eyes."Yep, same old cousins, same old Sakai family.The title of my review comes from the famous line so frequently uttered by Bugs Bunny when he has been pushed too far and is about to invoke his own version of Shock and Awe. First uttered by Groucho Marx and others in  Duck Soup  it was a signal to the audience that peaceful and placating Bugs was about to massively retaliate, a deliberate attempt on the part of director Chuck Jones to justify to the audience the mayhem that was about to ensue.Camy Tang performs something similar here. Jenn, the quiet cousin, the good cousin, the one who liked everyone to get along,... the doormat, finally rebels against the selfish expectations of her censuring and crying and arguing and yelling and nagging family after they ruin her culinary degree celebration party by inviting the thug who beat her up in college and trying to force her to go to work at the family restaurant. So they respond by trying to bully her.BIG Mistake.With the help of her four cousins: Lex, Trish, and Venus, the heroines of the first three books; Mimi, finally fighting on the right side this time; and Edward Castillo, the (in Jenn's opinion) dreamy, Hispanic, Harley-riding but secretly nerdy farmer who rescued her from a couple of flat tires, Jenn will wage a war of increasing retaliation against her vengeful and uncaring family, and before I give you the wrong impression, let me assure you that every minute of it will be falling down laughing on the floor funny. According to the Author's Note, Ms. Tang was listening to the album  Every Time I Breathe  for inspiration while she was writing this book. As for me, I was hearing  The Carl Stalling Project: Music From Warner Bros. Cartoons, 1936-1958  playing in my head while I was reading it.So thus ends the saga of the screwball Sakai Family, or does it? After the events of this novel I can see the makings of a 5th book: cousin Mimi's story. In a Customer Discussion on the Sushi for One? Product Page Ms. Tang contemplates it, and the observant reader will notice that in this novel Ms. Tang places her Sushi Series and her Deadly Intent series into the same universe.Note: Ms. Tang is also the author of the start of another Asian-American Christian suspense romance novel series:  Protection for Hire .Note: For full disclosure I was given this ebook by the author rather than purchasing it.

So many great characters, I loved Jenn and her cousins and enjoyed seeing Jenn start to stand up for herself. The one aunt is a real piece of work, I wonder why she opened a restaurant when she doesn't do any of the work. She just seems to want the accolades for the restaurant and tries so many nasty ways to get Jenn back working for her. Crazy the scene where Jenn's ex-boyfriend shows up and the family stands up for him instead of Jenn. I was glad she didn't allow him back in her life, and I really liked Edward and the unusual way they met. I wasn't sure about the grandmother at first, but then she came through for Jenn in the end.

I knew that Camy Tang wrote Christian novels about Asian-American families living in northern California. I even bought two of her print books but I couldn't read them because the type was too small for me to read. So when "Weddings and Wasabi" came out for the Kindle, I just had to buy it.A Story About Many Things!What a surprise! The story is about many things. In a way, it is a coming of age story about the heroine, Jenn, who at 30-something, comes into her own as an independent family member and self-actualizing individual. It's an intriguing story of an extended Asian American family. Jenn has over fifty cousins living close by that she can call by name. It's a culinary story with lots of cooking. Jenn has just earned her cullinary degree. It's a wacky story with motorcycles and a central character who is a goat named Pookie. (Seriously).Inspiring, Intriguing, Good Times & SadIt is also an inspiring and intriguing story that weavs prayer and Christian values into complex family relationships where Buddhism is still practiced. It's also a sad story because life can be sad at the same time the good times are happening.It's One Big Novella!"Weddings and Wasabi" may be a novella but more happens in the story than you'd expect to find in a 300 page novel. (In fact, the author has indicated that"Weddings and Wasabi" would have been a novel if she had had the time to write it. She's now writing mysteries under contract for Love Inspired but still wanted to finish out this series for her Sushi fans.)What Kind of Book Is This?I did ask the author, who was doing a blog appearance at the time, what kind of book "Weddings and Wasabi" really was. She called it a "humorous contemporary romance". I differ a little with this description. I think "Weddings and Wasabi" is somewhere between a genre romance, where the central focus is on the relationship between the hero and heroine and women's fiction, where the central focus is on issues important to women.There Is a RomanceThere is a budding romance going on with Edward but it is not the central focus of the novel. Jenn and Edward seem ideal for each other and given more time they should find love and happiness. Edward looks the part of a bad boy with his new Harley motorcycle and leathers but he really works with his hands in the family vineyards.Gateway Book -- Well Edited!"Weddings and Wasabi" is a fun and easy way to sample Camy Tang's Sushi Series. It is an easy read. The editing is excellent. I did not find one typo or have to read any sentence twice to derive its meaning. I hope the author has time to give us Mimi's story!Five Stars & Highest Recommendation!

don't have one of my own, so watching a traditional construct is instructive. contemporary dialogue gets past the obstacles of tradition and gives the story some spunk. fun read.