I am highly privileged. Every time I read the stories of discrimination, I feel this. I felt the same while reading The Best Girls by Min Jin Lee. I found this tiny book on Amazon Prime when I was looking for something else. So, I decided to read this and the story is stuck in my head. Oh god!
The Best Girls is narrated by a young girl who is extremely talented but unfortunately, nobody cares about her talent. Her family believes that only a boy can save the dignity of any house or only he can bring the good days upon. Well, our narrator and her three sisters believe that too as they are told so since their birth.
When their brother is born, their family celebrates like never before. And then we see the narrator and her sister being sidelined for each and every thing. This book majorly highlights on the importance of having sons in Asian Culture. ( Not generalizing, but this notion still exists)
When the narrator talks about her achievements and awards in school, I was expecting it to be the happiest event in the book, but it was not . That was the most heartbreaking part of this book. Even more than the ending.
This 17 pages book is heavy but I recommend this book if you are okay with tragic endings.
This book is a part of the Disorder collection , which consists of six individually published short stories (All free on Amazon Prime and Kindle Unlimited). They're described as 'stories of living nightmares, chilling visions, and uncanny imagination that explore a world losing its balance in terrifying ways'.