Reviews: 'Rich People Problems,' by Kevin Kwan, and 'The Roanoke Girls,' by Amy Engel

Rich People Problems

By Kevin Kwan. (Doubleday, 398 pages, $27.95.)

If you've been awaiting "Rich People Problems," then you know about Kevin Kwan's previous two novels, "Crazy Rich Asians" and "China Rich Girlfriend." If you don't know about them, but your friend next to you on the beach is half-engrossed/half-collapsing in laughter while reading "Rich People Problems," then go find the first two. It's essential. Because, frankly, it'd be difficult for your friend to fill you in on the plot(s) because there are so many of them. But it's not even the plot(s) that have made Kwan's books million-sellers. Instead, it's his deft skewering of rich Asians, old families who are impossibly, improbably wealthy to the degree where they pity mere multimillionaires as impoverished. These are people who demand filial loyalty with such lines as, "You're my son — I've watched nannies change your diapers, you know!" Kwan's satirical lance has become slightly more subtle, while no less deadly, over the course of the trilogy. The books are the essence of the beach read: lively plot(s), memorable characters, able to be read with adult beverages at hand.

KIM ODE

"Sometimes you have to hurt people just to prove that you're alive." This line, delivered early in Amy Engel's provocative thriller, "The Roanoke Girls," proves a fitting introduction to the psyche of Lane Roanoke, a young woman struggling to come to terms with the suicide of her mother and the secrets rooted in the family estate in rural Kansas. The engrossing novel by Engel, a former criminal defense attorney, offers everything a reader could hope for — multidimensional characters, a page-turning plot and surprises that continue to unfurl throughout the story. Studying the family tree at the beginning of the book may offer careful readers hints of the family saga that follows, but the author has plenty of surprises in store. Highly recommended!

COLLEEN KELLY