High school senior Frank Li has never had a girlfriend. His big sister Hanna made the mistake of falling in love with a non-Korean, and now his parents act as though she died. Frank knows that should his heart follow the same path, he will no doubt suffer the same fate. But since “Korean-Americans make up only 1 percent of everyone in the Republic of California, out of which 12 percent are girls my age, which would result in a dating pool with only one girl every three square miles,” Frank feels doomed to a life of celibate solitude. Enter Brit Means, Frank’s sexy Calculus classmate. Brit is hot, smart and white. Frank couldn’t be more astonished when he discovers Brit is as into him as he is to her. He also knows he can never introduce her to his racist parents. So Frank concocts a complicated scheme in which he dates Brit, but tricks his parents into thinking he’s really dating his Korean friend and neighbor Joy Song. Joy goes along with this because she’s secretly dating Wu Tang, a Chinese jock who her parents would never accept. What starts out as a bad idea gets immeasurably worse when Frank realizes that he just might actually like Joy after all. Could his fake date end up being his true love? Only time will tell, but Frank’s is running out as senior year rushes onward, college acceptances roll in, and long hidden family secrets rise to the surface.
Debut author David Yoon, husband of the writerly wonderful Nicola Yoon, fearlessly tackles issues of inter-generational race relations, privilege, and the deeply uncomfortable and often untenable situation of being stuck between two cultures, while being very, very funny. “The K in KBBQ stands for Korean. As does the K in K-pop, K-fashion or K-dramas. There’s of course no such thing as ABBQ, A-pop or A-dramas.” Frank is a smart, confused, of- the-moment teenage guy who’s just trying to understand life, love and his place in the world. “There are tribes within tribes, all separated by gaps everywhere. Gaps in time, gaps between generations. Money creates gaps…if there are that many micro-tribes all over the place, what does Korean even mean? What do any of the labels anywhere mean?” No matter who you are or where you come from, you are going to find something to LOVE about Frank Li. Coming to a library, bookstore or Kindle near you September 2019.