Judy Fong Bates was born in China and came to Canada as a young child. She grew up in several small Ontario towns. She taught elementary school in Toronto and was active in the local storytelling community before devoting herself more fully to writing. Some of her stories have been broadcast on CBC radio. Bates now lives on a farm outside of Toronto.
Fiction (Short stories)
China Dog and Other Tales From a Chinese Laundry
Toronto: Sister Vision, 1997.
New York: Counterpoint, 2002. [This edition has cover title: China Dogs and Other Stories From a Chinese Laundry]
PS8553 .A84 C45 2002
Publisher’s Synopsis (Sister Vision)
Set in small town Ontario, these vivid, richly textured, often wryly funny stories, bring together a host of Chinese immigrants, from the turn of the century to the present. Fong Bates’ dazzling assortment of characters will arouse, capture and delight. She is a storyteller confident in her authority and language.
Fiction
Midnight at the Dragon Café
Toronto: M&S, 2004.
PS8553 .A84 M44 2004
Publisher’s Synopsis
Set in a small Ontario town in the 1960s, [this] is the story of a young girl whose life is changed over the course of one summer when she learns the burden of secrets and, ultimately, something of forgiveness.
… Bates vividly captures a time and place and the complexities of a childhood divided by two cultures and touched by unspoken secrets and unfulfilled longings.
Awards and Honours
2005 Evergreen Award, Fiction — Ontario Library Association (Nominated)
2006 Alex Award — American Library Association (One of ten winners)
2006 ALA Notable Book for Adult Fiction
2011 Chosen for Toronto Public Library’s One Book Program
Anthology (Short story/Excerpt from work in progress)
Tok. Book 3
Bates, Judy Fong. “If You Only Knew.” In Tok. Book 3, edited by Helen Walsh. Toronto: Zephyr Press, 2008, 71-79.
Non-fiction (Memoir)
The Year of Finding Memory: A Memoir
Toronto: Random House Canada, 2010
PS8553 .A827 Z478 2010
Publisher’s Synopsis (From its website)
An elegant and surprising book about a Chinese family’s difficult arrival in Canada, and a daughter’s search to understand remarkable and terrible truths about her parents’ past lives.
Selected Criticism and Interpretation
Diehl, Lindsay. “Family Secrets and Ghostly Hauntings,” chap. in her Reading With My Grandmother: Chinese Canadian Literature, History, and Family. Waterloo: University of Waterloo Press, 2026, 19-60.
e-book (Access restricted to members of the university community)
Links
Judy Fong Bates personal website
Publisher McClelland & Stewart
Publisher Penguin Random House Canada
Amnesty International book club discussion for China Dog and Other Stories