Homeseeking by Karissa Chen: Summary and Study Guide

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Quick Facts

• Publication year: 2025

• Genre: Historical fiction, literary fiction, romance

• Setting: Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the United States (Chinese diaspora)

• Narrator: Third-person limited, alternating between Suchi and Howard

• Structure: Suchi's narrative moves forward in time; Howard's moves backward, with few exceptions

• Languages: English with code-switching across Mandarin, Cantonese, Shanghainese, and other Sinitic languages

Short Summary

Homeseeking follows two childhood sweethearts separated by war and history. Suchi's narrative moves forward from her 1938 Shanghai childhood through wartime separation, refugee life in Hong Kong, and a forced marriage to a wealthy shipping magnate. Haiwen's (later Howard's) narrative moves backward from his 2008 widowhood in Los Angeles to his 1938 Shanghai youth, wartime conscription, and decades in Taiwan. The alternating timelines converge on a late-life reunion in Los Angeles, where the two must confront the decades of silence, sacrifice, and survival that kept them apart. Through their parallel journeys across Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and America, the novel explores how displacement reshapes identity, how music preserves memory, and whether the past can ever truly be reclaimed.

Full Summary

Structure and Opening

Homeseeking opens with two epigraphs that establish the novel's central preoccupation: the past is visible but ungraspable, and one cannot go back. The first, from the film In the Mood for Love, describes bygone years as a dusty windowpane—visible but not reachable. The second, from Eileen Chang's Half a Lifelong Romance, states plainly that one cannot go back. A note on languages explains the novel's approach to representing different Sinitic languages and its structure: Suchi's narrative moves forward in time while Howard's moves backward.

Suchi's Forward Narrative

Suchi's story begins in 1938 Shanghai, where seven-year-old Suji hears violin music from a neighboring shikumen and befriends Wang Haiwen, a small boy teased by classmates. Their friendship deepens through shared lunches and walks home, and by 1945, fourteen-year-old Suchi has developed romantic feelings for Haiwen. They visit a fortune teller who predicts Haiwen will find success far from home and that the two share a strong destiny (yuanfen). Days before Haiwen's violin recital, the United States bombs Hongkou, postponing the performance. Japan surrenders in August, and the neighborhood erupts in celebration. When Haiwen's bicycle breaks, Suchi kisses him.

In early 1947, Suchi and Haiwen spend time together as he practices for his conservatory audition. They argue over the civil war, with Suchi sympathetic to Communist ideals. Haiwen tells her airline stewardess applications are open, and she decides to apply. A new conscription act threatens to draft Haiwen's brother Haiming. Haiwen's father is detained and beaten by Nationalists, and to prove loyalty, Haiming must be drafted. Haiwen enlists in the army in his brother's place, leaving his violin with Suchi and departing on a train in April 1947.

In September 1948, Suchi and her sister Sulan leave Shanghai for Hong Kong on what their father presents as a business trip—actually a plan to keep them safe as Shanghai falls to the Communists. Their father's contact never appears, and they lodge at a boardinghouse. By late 1953, they have heard nothing from their parents for nine months. A letter arrives from Siau Zi, their father's former apprentice, now a Communist official, offering to protect their parents if Sulan returns to marry him. Suchi conceals the letter. A fire destroys the shantytown where Mrs. Chan's daughters were being treated for measles; Mrs. Chan and her daughters die. The sisters are given a week to leave, and Suchi hides the letter in her violin case.

In Hong Kong, Suchi works as a waitress at a nightclub, lying about her age. A wealthy shipping businessman, Lam Saikeung, becomes her patron, arranges for her to sing, and eventually proposes. When Suchi hesitates, he disappears for a month, then returns and pressures her, assaulting her in the dressing room. He gives her a diamond ring and sets a May wedding. Sulan's symptoms worsen; a British doctor diagnoses multiple sclerosis. Lam pays the medical bills, leaving Suchi feeling trapped. Overwhelmed, she takes a ferry intending to jump, but cannot go through with it. On the return crossing, she sees Haiwen.

Suchi marries Lam Saikeung and has a son, Samson. The marriage is marked by domestic control and abuse. In October 1972, Soukei (as Suchi is now called) takes Samson to an amusement park after his pet rabbit dies, and the outing triggers a confrontation with Saikeung about her parenting. In May–September 1985, Soukei helps Samson move into his dorm at the University of Southern California. Saikeung makes racist remarks about Samson's roommate and forces him to switch rooms. After Saikeung leaves for Singapore, Soukei stays a week touring the city with Samson. On her last night, Samson asks why she won't leave his father. Unable to sleep, she changes her flight, calls Sulan, and flies to New York.

Howard's Backward Narrative

Howard's narrative moves backward from 2008. In January 2008, Howard, still grieving his wife Linyee who died sixteen months earlier, encounters Suchi at a 99 Ranch Market in Los Angeles. They recognize each other and exchange brief updates but part without exchanging contact information. Later, at a friend's birthday party, Winston arrives with a date who turns out to be Suchi. They talk, recalling their youth. Suchi reveals her sister Sulan died in 1990. She tells him she felt the same way when he left, calls him by a childhood nickname, and says the past is past.

Howard and Suchi continue meeting regularly for meals. Suchi invites Howard to her family's Chinese New Year dinner. When Howard tries to discuss their shared past and the fortune teller's prediction that they would reunite, Suchi refuses, saying the Suchi he knew died long ago and she survives by not looking backward. She asks him to leave. Howard departs, resolving to break through her resistance.

The backward narrative then traces Howard's earlier life. In December 1981, Howard travels to New York City for a business meeting. He meets Sulan Chang, Suchi's sister, who reacts with hostility, telling him Suchi is married with a son in Hong Kong. Later, Sulan finds him at his hotel, apologizes, and gives him an envelope with Suchi's phone number, describing Suchi's unhappy marriage. Howard fantasizes about reuniting with Suchi but calls his wife, Linyee, who mentions finding a gold ring in his violin case—a ring his mother had given him for Suchi. Afterward, Howard destroys the envelope and flushes it away, choosing to appreciate his family.

In April 1993, Howard returns to Shanghai for the first time in decades. He meets his sister Junjun and brother Haiming. They visit the old shikumen, where a tenant reveals that Howard's letters were reported and turned in. Over dinner, Haiming tells Howard that Junjun denounced their father to the Red Guards, leading to his death. Howard visits his mother's grave, then confronts Junjun, who defends her actions. Before departing, Junjun mentions that Suchi's mother had been in contact, but Howard cannot find her.

In April 1975, Haiwen learns that President Chiang Kai-shek has died. Watching the funeral coverage, Haiwen breaks down crying. Yijun brings his violin, and he plays a long series of pieces, eventually calming down. In February 1959 in Keelung, Haiwen learns that Li Tsin, a fellow soldier, drowned after attempting to steal a fisherman's boat. Zenpo, another soldier, argues that locals cannot be trusted, but Haiwen finds warmth playing dice with local Taiwanese men. He stops at an oyster omelet stand, where the owner's daughter, Tsai Linyee, serves him and converses with him about Shanghai. She invites him to return, but Haiwen decides he cannot go back.

In March 1966, Haiwen travels to Hong Kong on a business trip while struggling with a gambling habit that has strained his marriage to Linyee. On the Star Ferry, he encounters Suchi, his first love, whom he hasn't seen in nineteen years. They reunite over tea, and Suchi reveals she kept his violin all these years and returns it to him. They spend an evening reminiscing and become intimate at his hotel. The next morning, Suchi leaves a note saying she is getting married and that she's relieved to know he's alive. Haiwen waits for her at the congee shop on subsequent mornings without success, then departs Hong Kong.

In March–April 1947, Haiwen struggles through a violin lesson, distracted by his brother Haiming's impending conscription. His mother gives him a gold ring, suggesting he consider marrying Suchi. That night, Haiwen overhears his parents discussing their inability to bribe officials to spare Haiming, and learns the family's debts stem from his violin lessons. Haiming asks Haiwen to watch over his unborn child if he does not return. Haiwen considers enlisting in Haiming's place but flees. He pawns a record to buy Suchi a belated birthday pin, but overhears her defending him and leaves without seeing her. Later, he plays Massenet for his mother and decides to enlist, planning to tell her afterward.

Convergence

In spring 2008, Suchi learns from her son Samson that Howard called with information about her parents, but she refuses to hear it. At choir rehearsal, friends tell her Howard recently got lost driving home, raising concerns about his memory. Suchi calls Haiwen, who reports that his niece traced Suchi's mother to an elderly care home in Shanghai, where she is alive but nearly blind and not always lucid. Suchi doubts the news and confides in Momo, who urges her to go. Samson confronts Suchi about her secrecy and persuades her to consider the trip. Suchi and Haiwen reconcile over a meal, and she tells him the story of when she first fell in love with him. She decides to fly to Shanghai with Samson and Haiwen, planning to meet her mother and hoping to be recognized.

The novel's final chapter, set in June 1982, shows Haiwen's mother, Li Yuping, on her deathbed in Shanghai, attended by Suchi's mother, Sen Sieu'in. Yuping gives Sieu'in a gold ring, saying it belongs to Sieu'in's daughter. She tries to dictate a letter to her children, but Sieu'in reveals she cannot read or write. Yuping imagines the letter being sent to Haiwen. She hears Haiwen's violin and calls his name. Sieu'in promises to tell Haiwen that she waited as long as she could.

Main Characters

• Suchi — The novel's female protagonist. Her narrative moves forward from her 1938 Shanghai childhood through wartime separation, refugee life in Hong Kong, and a late-life reunion with her first love in Los Angeles. She is known as Suji in childhood and Soukei in her Hong Kong years.

• Haiwen (Howard) — The novel's male protagonist. His narrative moves backward from his 2008 widowhood in Los Angeles to his 1938 Shanghai youth, wartime conscription, and decades in Taiwan. He goes by Howard in the United States.

• Sulan — Suchi's older sister, who flees with her to Hong Kong, later emigrates to New York, and repeatedly urges Suchi to leave her abusive marriage.

• Linyee — Haiwen's Taiwanese wife, whom he meets in Keelung in 1959, who supports him through his gambling and grief, and whose death in 2006 leaves him a widower.

• Lam Saikeung — A wealthy Hong Kong shipping magnate who becomes Suchi's patron, forces her into marriage, and subjects her to domestic control and abuse.

• Junjun — Haiwen's younger sister, who denounces their father to the Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution and later reconnects with Haiwen during his 1993 return to Shanghai.

Themes

• The Unreachable Past and the Impossibility of Return — The novel explores how the past remains visible but ungraspable, with characters unable to return to the years that have vanished despite their persistent longing.

• Displacement and Multilingual Identity in the Diaspora — Migration across Chinese-speaking regions reshapes identity, with language serving as both a survival tool and a marker of shifting self-conception.

• Music as Memory and Emotional Refuge — Music functions as a repository of memory and an emotional refuge, connecting characters across decades of separation and loss.

• Sacrifice and Duty Versus Personal Fulfillment — The novel repeatedly stages conflicts between family obligation and individual desire, examining how duty shapes the choices available to its characters across generations.

• Forgetting as Survival Versus Remembering as Healing — The novel contrasts strategies of survival through not looking backward with attempts to reclaim the past, asking whether forgetting or remembering offers a viable path forward.

Symbols

• Violin — The violin, which Haiwen plays and later entrusts to Suchi, recurs as a symbol of their connection, lost love, and the persistence of memory across decades and continents.

• Gold ring — The gold ring, given by Haiwen's mother for Suchi and hidden in his violin case, symbolizes unfulfilled promises, sacrifice, and the choice between past and present love.

• Shikumen — The shikumen houses of Sifo Li, the childhood neighborhood, represent home, memory, and the irrecoverable past that characters both long for and flee.

• Sea — The sea, crossed by characters between Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and America, serves as a recurring motif of separation, exile, and the possibility of return.

Ending Overview

The novel's ending brings Suchi and Haiwen to the threshold of a final reunion. In spring 2008, Suchi learns that her mother is alive in an elderly care home in Shanghai, nearly blind and not always lucid. After initial resistance, Suchi reconciles with Haiwen and decides to fly to Shanghai with her son Samson and Haiwen, hoping her mother will recognize her. The novel's final chapter, set in June 1982, shows Haiwen's mother, Li Yuping, on her deathbed, giving Suchi's mother the gold ring meant for Suchi and imagining a letter that will never be sent. Read the full ending analysis.

Chapter-by-Chapter Summary

| Chapter 3: April 1947 | April 1947 | Haiwen prepares to enlist and leave Shanghai, v.