{"id":30590,"date":"2025-01-13T13:16:02","date_gmt":"2025-01-13T17:16:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/?p=30590"},"modified":"2026-05-02T15:57:06","modified_gmt":"2026-05-02T19:57:06","slug":"han-ong-ming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/2025\/01\/13\/han-ong-ming\/","title":{"rendered":"Han Ong: “Ming”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

“Ming”<\/strong><\/span>
by Han Ong<\/span>
from the January 20, 2025 issue of The New Yorker<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the past few years, more and more of Han Ong’s fiction has appeared in The New Yorker<\/em>. “Ming” is his seventh to appear in the magazine since her first showed up in the summer fiction issue in 2019. I think it’s time I paid more attention, as I’m not sure I’ve read any of the previously published ones, but I would like to get to know such a prolific New Yorker<\/em> fiction writer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is how “Ming” begins:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Thadeus had never offered to take Johnny Mac out for a meal before. This is new, Johnny Mac says, grinning. For twenty-five years, Johnny Mac worked as a tenant-rights lawyer. He is a fount of varied and surprising knowledge.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thadeus orders a burger, fries, and a Coke, just like Johnny Mac.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Remember around 2015, 2016, when I was poet-in-residence at N.Y.U. Langone? Thadeus asks. The cancer ward. A section of the cancer ward.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Johnny Mac smiles. Not firsthand, but I\u2019ve heard from the others. This is Thad with the hundred and one stories about cancer!<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What others? Who\u2019ve you been talking to?<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ed? Johnny Mac says. Lidell?<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ed is dead now\u2014has been dead for three years. Lidell, who knows where he is. He disappeared from the meetings around 2018. Rumor has it that he took classes in coding and is now working for Google out in California.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What could they have said? I never told them much.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

I look forward to your thoughts below!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This week’s New Yorker fiction is Han Ong’s “Ming.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30591,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"libsyn-item-id":0,"libsyn-show-id":0,"libsyn-post-error":"","libsyn-post-error_post-type":"","libsyn-post-error_post-permissions":"","libsyn-post-error_api":"","playlist-podcast-url":"","libsyn-episode-thumbnail":"","libsyn-episode-widescreen_image":"","libsyn-episode-blog_image":"","libsyn-episode-background_image":"","libsyn-post-episode-category-selection":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_thumbnail":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_theme":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_height":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_width":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_placement":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link_text":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_custom_color":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-explicit":"","libsyn-post-episode":"","libsyn-post-episode-update-id3":"","libsyn-post-episode-release-date":"","libsyn-post-episode-simple-download":"","libsyn-release-date":"","libsyn-post-update-release-date":"","libsyn-is_draft":"","libsyn-new-media-media":"","libsyn-post-episode-subtitle":"","libsyn-new-media-image":"","libsyn-post-episode-keywords":"","libsyn-post-itunes":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-season-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-type":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-title":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-author":"","libsyn-destination-releases":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-enabled":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-input-enabled":false,"libsyn-post-episode-premium_state":"","libsyn-episode-shortcode":"","libsyn-episode-embedurl":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1323,94],"tags":[1504],"coauthors":[505],"class_list":["post-30590","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-han-ong","category-new-yorker-fiction","tag-2025-new-yorker-fiction"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/January-20-2025-Featured-Image.jpg?fit=700%2C401&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pqqvZ-7Xo","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30590","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30590"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30590\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31048,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30590\/revisions\/31048"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30591"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30590"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=30590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}