A Crazy Rich Asians Reading List
I’m late to the party on Crazy Rich Asians, but that doesn’t curb the obsession. As of writing this, I’m on book three, Rich People Problems—and it’s got me hook, line, and sinker. Books like Crazy Rich Asians are fun romps around a division of society barely truly looked at. We like to sniff at rich people, but we don’t often bother to take a microscope to their lives. That doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of this post, though, because I’m here for the books. The most obvious Crazy Rich Asians reading list is the books themselves. However, book two presented another book list that caught my eye.
The Books Amongst the Food, Etc.
Don’t get me wrong, I love tons of food and a little bit of drama. I also like to think I have a healthy appreciation of beautiful clothing just as much as the next gal. But when the social image coach of book two presented one of her clients with a reading list, I had to share it with you all.
PC: Elaine Atherholt austenetc.com
A Crazy Rich Asians Reading List
The character in need of social help is Kitty Pong. A side character from book 1, Kitty busts onto the scene in book 2 and needs help refining her image. To help her out is Corinna Ko-Tung who offers a social impact assessment meant to completely transform Kitty’s life and image, hopefully placing her at the center of high society when all is said and done. To get there, though, Kitty must read the following list.
Snobs by Julian Fellowes
The Piano Teacher by Janice Y.K. Lee
People Like Us by Dominick Dunne
The Power of Style by Annette Tapert and Diana Edkins (apparently this is out of print, womp womp)
Pride and Avarice by Nicholas Coleridge
Soong Dynasty by Sterling Seagrave
D.V. by Diana Vreeland
A Princess Remembers: the Memoirs of the Maharani of Jaipur by Gayatri Devi
The complete works of Jane Austen (starting with Pride and Prejudice)
The Custom of the Country, The Age of Innocence, The Buccaneers, and The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton (in that order)
Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh
The Palliser Series by Anthony Trollope
Side note: how many of these do you think all of Corinna’s clients actually read as opposed to simply said they read?
PC: Image sourced from Amazon Prime Video
Books Are Important
The best thing about this list (besides the Jane Austen 😉) is the fact that books, especially classics, are important. They’re important to understanding who you are, where you come from, why the world is the way it is, and what the people before us knew. No matter where you are from or what your financials look like.
I know this list was probably fabricated by the Crazy Rich Asians author Kevin Kwan, but I like to think that we all read that list and completely agreed with its completeness. Of course, there are plenty of modern books that can be slowly added to this list. But this handful of historical reads is so timeless that I bet (and hope) they will make an appearance on reading lists for generations to come.
Happy reading!
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