Lucy Wu thinks she’s about to have the perfect year because her annoying perfect big sister is finally moving out of the room they share, and she is going to have a room to herself. She’s at the top grade in her school. Her basketball team looks good, and then her dad comes home and tells her that he has found a long lost great aunt in China, and she’s coming to stay with them, and the only place she can stay is in Lucy’s room, and so then Lucy has to learn how to deal with disappointment.
Yi Po is Lucy’s mother’s, mother’s sister, and there is a long back story about how they became separated, and she comes into Lucy’s world — she’s basically a very patient person. You know, she may or may not be aware that Lucy is not on her best behavior around her, but she gives Lucy space and loves her unconditionally until Lucy is ready to have a roommate and think about her family’s heritage.
In terms of temperament, I definitely had an aunt like that. So my Yi Po was just this incredibly loving person. She was a kindergarten teacher, and she was like the kind of kindergarten teacher that people in their 60s would go back and visit, and so, yeah, she kind of was this very patient and abiding person.
Probably when I was about 12 or 13 my mother’s mother came to live with us, and I actually don’t remember how long, but I remember she was there. We had a hard time communicating because my Chinese was not very good. She did not speak English, and I think part of the reason why I wrote Lucy is because I wished that I had done a better job as a kid ‘cause she passed away shortly after she came to visit, and I wish I had done a better job of communicating with her and getting to know her ‘cause I think we actually probably had a lot in common, you know?
And so I think Lucy is partly my way of rewriting that story, like, okay, here’s what would have happened if I had gotten my act together, basically.