In C Pam Zhang's How Much of These Hills Is Gold, signs of and references to tigers consistently appear around its characters, although they are presumed to be in the American West where (at least in the real world) native tigers don't exist. For example, Lucy, the main character, mentions that her mother draws a tiger in the doorway of every new home when they arrive. Late in the book, there are rumors about a tiger roaming around the frontier town where Lucy lives. Paw prints that seem like they could belong to tigers randomly appear. While Zhang's novel never explicitly states that Lucy and her family are of Chinese ancestry, this is heavily implied through linguistic and cultural elements of which the tiger references are a part.

Historically, tigers have great significance in Chinese culture and the cultures of many other nations in Asia. The tiger has played a major role in symbolism, mythology, beliefs and medicine throughout the Asian continent for millennia. Considering ...