Book Summary and Reviews of Tiger's Mouth by Lucy Tan

Book Summary

When two young men from very different backgrounds meet during a tech internship, it sparks an intense friendship—and even more intense competition—in this sweeping novel of privilege, identity, and ambition from the acclaimed author of What We Were Promised.

As the oldest son of caterers from Queens, Jack Chen learned from an early age that to be afforded the same opportunities as the rich kids he studied on the subway, he had to act like one. When he finagles his way into a prestigious internship at tech giant K.O. Systems, he's prepared to fake everything: his credentials, his confidence, even his entire past. What he isn't prepared for is his officemate, Jack Owens, the depressed son of the company's billionaire founder, who's only there for a summer reprieve from his father's scrutiny.

Their connection is immediate, if tenuous. Chen sees a version of the life he wants; Owens sees someone who recognizes the pain he's been taught to hide. But as the summer unfolds and corporate pressures close in, familiarity breeds contempt, and the Jacks go from collaborators to competitors. In the following years, Chen and Owens hold a mirror to each other's successes and failures, trying on each other's lives for size. They circle like opponents in their favorite board game, Go—territorial, tactical, always one move away from collapse. But when Chen discovers disturbing logic within a new app's design from K.O. Systems, he must contend with who he used to be, how far he's come, and the friend he left behind.

Nostalgic, heart-wrenching, and propulsive, Tiger's Mouth is a nuanced portrait of complex friendship, family dynamics, and love in its most unexpected forms.