Emiko Jean in Conversation With Kristina McMorris

One phone call changes everything. At 35, Mika Suzuki’s life is a mess. Her last relationship ended in flames. Her roommate-slash-best friend might be a hoarder. She’s a perpetual disappointment to her traditional Japanese parents. And, most recently, she’s been fired from her latest dead-end job. Mika is at her lowest point when she receives a phone call from Penny — the daughter she placed for adoption 16 years ago. Penny is determined to forge a relationship with her birth mother, and in turn, Mika longs to be someone Penny is proud of. Faced with her own inadequacies, Mika embellishes a fact about her life. What starts as a tiny white lie slowly snowballs into a fully-fledged fake life, one where Mika is mature, put-together, successful in love and her career. The details of Mika’s life might be an illusion, but everything she shares with curious, headstrong Penny is real: her hopes, dreams, flaws, and Japanese heritage. The harder-won heart belongs to Thomas Calvin, Penny’s adoptive widower father. What starts as a rocky, contentious relationship slowly blossoms into a friendship and, over time, something more. But can Mika really have it all — love, her daughter, the life she’s always wanted? Or will Mika’s deceptions ultimately catch up to her? In the end, Mika must face the truth — about herself, her family, and her past — and answer the question, just who is Mika in real life? Mika in Real Life (William Morrow) is the whip-smart, laugh-out-loud funny, and utterly heartwarming new novel from Emiko Jean, author of Tokyo Ever After — at once a heart-wrenching and uplifting work that explores the weight of silence, the secrets we keep, and what it means to be a mother. Jean will be joined in conversation by Kristina McMorris, author of The Ways We Hide and Sold on a Monday.

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