A historical novel based on the life of the actress Anna May Wong--the first and only Asian American woman to gain movie stardom in the early days of Hollywood.
The Brightest Star reprises plenty of biographical details of Wong’s life, but it stops short of offering any depth ... The first-person voice — a rhetorical device that should have allowed for intimacy and personality — is eerily lifeless ... A great irony haunts the novel: Although it seeks to challenge the films that pandered to a White audience that could not stomach seeing a Chinese actress on screen, the novel itself panders to a White audience that hungers for tales of legible ethnic struggle.
Riveting ... At times, the narrative breezes rather quickly through Anna’s accomplishments, but overall, this stirring story about the drive and courageous spirit of a talented, barrier-breaking American icon works magnificently.
In offering so much painstaking, historically accurate detail, Tsukiyama sacrifices story. For readers familiar with Wong’s biography, the book reads too much like an elevated Wikipedia entry ... This sympathetic account of a silver-screen legend flies admirably between triumph and tragedy but struggles to soar.
