Vanessa Hua's Coyoteland is a fast-paced and often humorous novel brimming with community and family woes that nevertheless balances strife with hope.
The upscale Bay Area suburb El Nido is desirable, but the brusque welcome the Chang family receives from their new neighbor, real estate developer Blair Belle, is a tip-off that fitting in could be challenging. As Jin Chang hides his tenuous financial straits from his family, his daughter, Jane, bravely assists another teen, Tasha, when she's attacked by a notorious marauding coyote. The girls are the primary protagonists within the novel's large cast of characters, the residents of El Nido, who are all struggling to succeed in their own ways. Jane, who is Chinese American, and Tasha, who is Black, identify the exclusionary attitudes of their privileged peers and the adults around them. They hatch a plot to jeopardize the Belle family's housing development, which is designed to attract affluent buyers.
Oblivious to how their experiences coming of age during the Covid-19 pandemic have led to a naïve reliance on the Internet, the teens use social media to anonymously mock El Nido and what they perceive to be its hypocrisies, with disastrous results. Meanwhile, Ana, the Belles's nanny, appreciates the opportunities the town offers her young son, yet her struggles for security include anxiety over immigration restrictions.
Hua (A River of Stars; Forbidden City) imbues even the snootiest townspeople with redeeming qualities. They share the threat of encroaching wildfires, and they eventually prioritize community spirit over personal prominence, evolving to embrace compromise and forgiveness. --Cheryl McKeon, Book House, Albany, N.Y.