Charles Yu

Charles Yu (Chinese name: You Chao-Kai/"游朝凱"; born 1976, in Los Angeles) is a Taiwanese-American writer. He is the author of the novels How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe and Interior Chinatown and the short-story collections Third Class Superhero and Sorry Please Thank You. In 2007 he was named a "5 under 35" honoree by the National Book Foundation.[1]

Charles Yu at the 2011 Texas Book Festival.

How to Live Safely was ranked the year's second-best science fiction novel by the Center for the Study of Science Fiction at the University of Kansas and was also a runner up for the Campbell Memorial Award.[2]

Writing

In 2007, Yu was selected by the National Book Foundation as one of its "5 Under 35", a program which highlights the work of the next generation of fiction writers by asking five previous National Book Award fiction Winners and Finalists to select one fiction writer under the age of 35 whose work they find particularly promising and exciting. Yu was selected for the honor by Richard Powers.[1]

Short stories

His fiction has been published in a number of magazines and literary journals, including Oxford American, Playboy, Esquire.com, GeekDad on Wired.com and Wired, The Gettysburg Review, Harvard Review, Mid-American Review, Mississippi Review, The New Yorker, Eclectica Magazine, The Malahat Review, 5 Trope, Sou'wester, Explosion-Proof and Alaska Quarterly Review, as well as cited for special mention in the Pushcart Prize Anthology XXVIII.

Yu also received the 2004 Sherwood Anderson Fiction Award from the Mid-American Review for his story, "Third Class Superhero".[3]

Many of these published short stories have been anthologized into two book collections: Third Class Superhero (2006, Harvest Books) and Sorry Please Thank You: Stories (2012, Pantheon Books, Random House). His short story "Hero Absorbs Major Damage" from Sorry Please Thank You has been re-mixed/re-presented with annotated commentary from the Hero's thief, navigator and chef (an elf named Fjoork), as a collaborative project between the annotation website Genius (behind Rap Genius) and Electric Literature.

Yu's uncollected short fiction has also appeared in The New Yorker ("Fable" in the May 30, 2016 Issue), VICE magazine's tech-oriented Motherboard website ("Re: re: Microwave in the break room doing weird things to fabric of spacetime"), Lightspeed Magazine and Wired.

Three of Yu's short stories initially published in Lightspeed Magazine have been anthologized in other books:

  • "Bookkeeper, Narrator, Gunslinger" (originally published in the April 2017 issue), which has been anthologized in Dead Man's Hand: An Anthology of The Weird West, Ed. John Joseph Adams (Titan Books 2014).
  • "America: The Ride" (originally published in the November 2018 issue), anthologized in Resist: Tales from a Future Worth Fighting Against, Eds. Gary Whitta, Hugh Howey, and Christie Yant (Broad Reach Publishing 2018).
  • "NPC" (published in the September 2018 issue), anthologized in Press Start to Play, Eds. Daniel H. Wilson & John Joseph Adams (Vintage Books 2015).

Yu has also published two short stories in Wired: "The Future of Work, Placebo" (December 17, 2018) and "Subtext®:It Knows What You're Thinking Stop Thinking" (December 13, 2016, The Fiction Issue).[4][5]

He has also published a short story entitled "Bounty" (filed under "2069") in the Xprize ANA Avatar online anthology.[6]

As for editing anthologies, Yu served as the Guest Editor for the Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2017 from The Best American Series and the publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.[7]

Novels

His first novel, How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe, was ranked the year's second-best science fiction novel by the Center for the Study of Science Fiction at the University of Kansas — and a runner up for the Campbell Memorial Award.[2] The book was also optioned by film director and writer Chris Columbus' production company, 1492 Pictures.[8][9] The novel was further listed in Time magazine's Top 10 Fiction Books of 2010, the New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2010, and was one of Amazon.com's Top 10 SF/F Books for 2010.

In 2020, Yu released his second novel, Interior Chinatown, which uses the innovative narrative structure of the screenplay format to tell the tale of Willis Wu, the "Generic Asian Man" who is stuck playing "Background Oriental Male" and occasionally "Delivery Guy" in the fictional police procedural Black and White but who longs to be "Kung Fu Guy" on screens worldwide.[10] On January 27, 2020, Yu appeared on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah to discuss the book, as well as the lack of on-screen representation for Asian Americans and the Asian American "model minority myth".[11] Yu further appeared on NPR's Weekend Edition with Scott Simon, January 25, 2020,[12] and on the Los Angeles Review of Books Radio Hour with Medaya Ocher and Kate Wolf on February 3, 2020[13] to further discuss the novel.

His forthcoming novel is tentatively entitled The Book of Wishing and will be published by Pantheon Books.[14][7]

Screenplays and TV writing

In 2016, Yu was a story editor for ten episodes of the first season of the 2016 HBO series Westworld, and co-wrote the episode "Trace Decay". For his work on the show, he received two Writers Guild of America Award Nominations in 2017: Drama Series and New Series.[15]

In 2018, Yu served as an executive story editor for ten episodes of the HBO series Here and Now, with the episode "Dream Logic" being written by him.

That same year he also wrote the episode "The Mysteries" for the AMC series Lodge 49.

In 2019, Yu also co-wrote the episode "Chapter 23" for the FX series Legion and served as a co-producer for eight episodes of that series.

He also wrote the episode "Mr. Greer" in the Facebook Watch series Sorry for Your Loss starring Elizabeth Olsen that year, and also served as a producer for nine episodes of that show.

In 2020, Yu worked on the writing staff of the Adult Swim show Dream Corp, LLC.

Other writing

Yu's non-fiction, essays, book reviews, journalism and other writing have also appeared online and in print in The Atlantic ("The Pre-pandemic Universe Was the Fiction"), Slate (various reviews and articles on video games such as L.A. Noire and Portal 2), The Wall Street Journal ("Novelist Charles Yu on St. George California Reserve Agricole Rum"), Time ("What It's Like to Never Ever See Yourself on TV"), The Offing ("Thirteen Ways of Looking at 45" about the 45th president of the United States, Donald Trump), The New York Times Style Magazine ("George R. R. Martin, Fantasy's Reigning King"), McSweeney's Internet Tendency ("What Kind of World Is This?"), The Morning News ("Buffalo Wild Wings Grill & Bar", a review) and Polygon ("What future artificial intelligence will think of our puny human video games").

He is interviewed by and also interviews Lev Grossman in The Believer (issue no. 112, "Conversation from the Shadow Lands. An Interview with Charles Yu") and comments on the work of Philip Roth (stating that he has "read more books by Roth than probably any other contemporary writer"), Don DeLillo, and Jonathan Lethem in installments of the "Influenced by" series published by Jaime Clarke in The Believer as well.[16][17][18][19]

He has also written reviews in The New York Times Book Review of books (novels or short story collections) from Neal Stephenson, Joe Hill, Jasper Fforde and John Wray.[20][21][22][23][24]

Personal life

Yu graduated from the University of California at Berkeley, majoring and receiving a Bachelor in Arts in Molecular and Cell Biology and a minor in Creative Writing, where he "wrote poetry, not fiction"[25] and also "took several poetry workshops with people like Thom Gunn and Ishmael Reed".[26] He also obtained his Juris Doctor degree from Columbia Law School.[27] Yu worked as an associate at the law firms of Sullivan & Cromwell and Bryan Cave as a corporate attorney, as the Director of Business Affairs at Digital Domain and also as Associate General Counsel at Belkin International before becoming a full-time fiction and TV writer.[27] He lives near Irvine, California with his wife, Michelle Jue, and their two children, Sophia and Dylan.[28] His brother is the actor and TV writer (Bob's Burgers), Kelvin Yu.

Awards and accolades

Bibliography

Novels
  • How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe (2010, Pantheon ISBN 0-307-37920-5)
  • Interior Chinatown (2020, Pantheon Books. ISBN 9780307907196)[29]

Short story collections

Uncollected short stories

Non-fiction

Essays

Book reviews

Teleplays
gollark: I mean, it could if people supported it, but it's politically impractical.
gollark: The UK has no constitution and *also* basically cannot change how voting works.
gollark: Which is silly for a variety of reasons - even if you agree with the concept of randomly reweighting votes based on area, at least do it honestly and directly and not in such a bizarre, convoluted and arbitrary way?
gollark: People are somewhat apiological sometimes and say "oh, but it's good because it balances out power in rural areas".
gollark: Well, Event 128-κ is probably *not* going to be repeated.

References
  1. National Book Foundation
  2. ) "The John W. Campbell Memorial Award" Updated 11 July 2011. Retrieved 2012-04-25.
  3. Author Page, Random House website.
  4. Wired - Charles Yu, https://www.wired.com/author/charles-yu/
  5. 8 Sci-Fi Writers Imagine the Bold and New Future of Work, Wired, December 17, 2018, https://www.wired.com/story/future-of-work-sci-fi-issue/
  6. Charles Yu, 2069, Bounty, http://www.avatars.inc/future_ideas/2069
  7. Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2017 Guest Editor: Charles Yu | Series Editor: John Joseph Adams, http://www.johnjosephadams.com/best-american/projects/basff2017/
  8. Daniel Miller, Chris Columbus' Production Company Acquires Sci-Fi Novel (Exclusive), The Hollywood Reporter, December 2, 2011, http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/how-live-safely-movie-chris-columbus-268890
  9. Charlie Jane Anders, Will Hollywood sentimentalize Charles Yu's How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe?, io9, December 2, 2011, http://io9.com/how-to-live-safely-in-a-science-fictional-universe/
  10. Carolyn Kellog, The Washington Post, Charles Yu's ‘Interior Chinatown’ brilliantly skewers Hollywood typecasting, https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/charles-yus-interior-chinatown-brilliantly-skewers-hollywood-typecasting/2020/01/27/4d04be48-3711-11ea-bf30-ad313e4ec754_story.html
  11. "The Daily Show with Trevor Noah – Charles Yu – Tackling On-Screen Asian Representation With "Interior Chinatown" – Extended Interview". cc.com. Comedy Partners. January 27, 2020. Retrieved May 4, 2020.
  12. Scott Simon, NPR Weekend Edition, January 25, 2020, 'Interior Chinatown' Puts That Guy In The Background Front And Center, https://www.npr.org/2020/01/25/799340952/interior-chinatown-puts-that-guy-in-the-background-front-and-center
  13. LARB AV, Literary LA: Satire, Metafiction, Anti-Racist Critique in Charles Yu's “Interior Chinatown”, https://lareviewofbooks.org/av/satire-metafiction-anti-racist-critique-charles-yus-interior-chinatown
  14. On Such a Full Sea: A Novel, Chang-rae Lee in conversation with novelist Charles Yu, https://lfla.org/event/on-such-a-full-sea-a-novel/
  15. WGA West, 2017 Writers Guild Awards Television, New Media, News, Radio, & Promotional Writing Nominations Announced, https://www.wga.org/news-events/news/press/2016/2017-wga-awards-tv-new-media-noms-announced
  16. Entire Collection of all "Influenced By" Believer posts, https://www.newtonvillebooks.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/BELIEVER.pdf
  17. Jaime Clarke, Believer Magazine, D, Influenced by (where Yu discusses DeDillo and White Noise), https://believermag.com/logger/2015-01-22-influenced-by-17/
  18. Jaime Clarke, Believer Magazine, L, Influenced by (where Yu discusses Jonathan Lethem), https://jameson-zimmer.squarespace.com/post/2015/02/03/influenced-by-9
  19. Jaime Clarke, Believer Magazine, R, Influenced by (where Yu discusses Philip Roth and states "I've read more books by Roth than probably any other contemporary writer"), https://jameson-zimmer.squarespace.com/post?offset=1423520640000
  20. Charles Yu, The New York Times Book Reviews, Fiction, Neal Stephenson's New Novel — Part Tech, Part Fantasy — Dazzles, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/14/books/review/fall-or-dodge-in-hell-neal-stephenson.html
  21. Charles Yu, The New York Times Book Reviews, Fiction, ‘Seveneves,’ by Neal Stephenson, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/31/books/review/seveneves-by-neal-stephenson.html
  22. Charles Yu, The New York Times Book Reviews, Fiction, Short Stories From Joe Hill, Spiked With Mayhem and Evil, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/books/review/full-throttle-joe-hill.html
  23. Charles Yu, The New York Times Book Reviews, Fiction, A Brilliantly Funny and Slightly Bonkers New Novel From Jasper Fforde, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/28/books/review/early-riser-jasper-fforde.html
  24. Charles Yu, The New York Times Book Reviews, Fiction, ‘The Lost Time Accidents,’ by John Wray, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/21/books/review/the-lost-time-accidents-by-john-wray.html
  25. Shawn Andrew Mitchell, Fiction Writers' Review, May 6, 2013, Fashionable Nonsense and a Better Brain: Part One of an Interview with Charles Yu, https://fictionwritersreview.com/interview/fashionable-nonsense-and-a-better-brain-part-one-of-an-interview-with-charles-yu/
  26. Robert Birnbaum, Charles Yu, https://themorningnews.org/article/charles-yu
  27. Charles Yu, LinkedIn, https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlesyu
  28. "Ten Questions for Charles Yu". Poets & Writers. 2020-01-28. Retrieved 2020-07-14.
  29. "Book Marks reviews of Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu". Book Marks. Retrieved 2020-01-31.
  30. Harvard Review, Charles Yu, https://www.harvardreview.org/contributor/charles-yu/
  31. Abby Macgregor, 10 Questions for Charles Yu, http://massreview.org/node/7345
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