Fresh Off the Boat

A Memoir

By: Eddie Huang

Narrated by: Eddie Huang

Length: 7 hrs and 55 mins

Publisher's summary

"Long before I met him, I was a fan of his writing, and his merciless wit. He’s bigger than food." (Anthony Bourdain)

Eddie Huang is the 30-year-old proprietor of Baohaus - the hot East Village hangout where foodies, stoners, and students come to stuff their faces with delicious Taiwanese street food late into the night - and one of the food world’s brightest and most controversial young stars. But before he created the perfect home for himself in a small patch of downtown New York, Eddie wandered the American wilderness looking for a place to call his own.

Eddie grew up in theme-park America, on a could-be-anywhere cul-de-sac in suburban Orlando, raised by a wild family of FOB ("fresh off the boat") hustlers and hysterics from Taiwan. While his father improbably launched a series of successful seafood and steak restaurants, Eddie burned his way through American culture, defying every "model minority" stereotype along the way. He obsessed over football, fought the all-American boys who called him a chink, partied like a gremlin, sold drugs with his crew, and idolized Tupac. His anchor through it all was food - from making Southern ribs with the Haitian cooks in his dad’s restaurant to preparing traditional meals in his mother’s kitchen to haunting the midnight markets of Taipei when he was shipped off to the homeland. After misadventures as an unlikely lawyer, street fashion renegade, and stand-up comic, Eddie finally threw everything he loved - past and present, family, and food - into his own restaurant, bringing together a legacy stretching back to China and the shards of global culture he’d melded into his own identity.

Funny, raw, and moving, and told in an irrepressibly alive and original voice, Fresh Off the Boat recasts the immigrant’s story for the 21st century. It’s a story of food, family, and the forging of a new notion of what it means to be American.

©2013 Eddie Huang (P)2013 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

"Mercilessly funny and provocative, Fresh Off the Boat is also a serious piece of work - and an important one. Eddie Huang is hunting nothing less than Big Game here - a question, a conversation, an argument: Who are we? If somebody’s going to put a thumb in your eye, it should probably be Eddie Huang. He does everything with style." (Anthony Bourdain)

"Brash, leading-edge, and unapologetically hip, Huang reconfigures the popular foodie memoir into something worthwhile and very memorable." (Publishers Weekly)

"Eddie Huang has a delightfully funny and down-to-earth narration style that captures the cultural nuances, mannerisms, and speech patterns of a diverse range of characters.... [H]is affable persona, expressive reading, occasional chuckles, and intentional digressions from the book to directly address audio listeners make his story and performance compelling and charming." (AudioFile)

Eddie Huang is the man!!

Eddie's story is pretty unique and rare, this guy is a true hustler.

He is a great narrator and really brings his story to life.

cool story

I liked his story telling and the book kept my interest the entire time. I would recommend to any hip minority raised in the ninety' s and early 2000's.

Honest and entertaining. An immigrant story.

Eddie wongs book was very fun. I think there are elements here that an person from an immigrant family will relate to, and beyond that, the book is about a man with a criminal youth attempting to find his purpose. It's funny at times, other times I was triggered by some dark memories of my own as the book does detail some cruelty from parents and otherwise. But on the whole, I feel this book was honest and entertaining. I have not seen the TV show of the same name but I am certainly interested to check it out!

Different. Interesting. Witty, and Unusual.

Story of growing up in an immigrant family in the South and the Deep South. If you are from the North, or especially from NYC, the author's southern roots spread throughout his story in attitude, opinion and even vocabulary. This is the story of an American shapeshifting until he finds his own niche and becomes a different and new American Identity that is his own. He reinvents himself to bring something new to the table in this ever-evolving "Americana". He is definitely not a copy of someone else. He takes you through his struggles, attitudes, and emotions with identity in a very witty way. As soon as I finished this one I read his later one right away. Just as entertaining. There are some good guys and bad guys in this tale but he brings their humanity to the surface so at the end of the stories, you love everyone and you are rooting for them all. This entrepreneur is just starting up. Anthony Bourdain pioneered a path with food/books/film and, I was a big fan of his. That said, his message at the end of his chapters was aways depressing and you were always left with the glass half empty., This guy is rebuilding those paths into paved roads filled with laughter, hope, and happy endings where the glass is always half full at the end of the adventure. He is a rising star. You will not be disappointed with this book or his later one.

My First Audio Book

As a M.I.T., I can relate to his life experiences and the pressure coming from a Taiwanese family. It was refreshing to hear of others in our generation marching through similar life events. Eddie, thank you for sharing your life stories. Your reading of your book makes everything comes to life including your description of the beef noodle soup. I hope everyone gets to experience this audio book as it is worth the read.

I ❤ Eddie Huang's story

always intended on reading this book after loving the show. it was interesting to see all the differences from reality vs film.

Funny, powerful, amazing

I LOVE this guy. He explains the minority experience with wit and heart. He's also hilarious! Can't wait to read it again!

Loved it!

True and authentic depiction of the author's life growing up as an Asian American. Highly recommend!

Phenomenal!

Eddie Huang is one of the realist human beings on this earth. this book is just one example of that. A must read!

I love it 100%

I’m a fresh off the ‘boat’ Asian and a new mom in America. I used to have a ‘go to STEM major or you pay for your own college’ policy for my kid but after listening to this, I plan to support my kids more for what he would like to do in this world.