Kirkus Style Review

Sex and Vanity by Kevin Kwan

A posh wedding is just the occasion to enjoy time with her cousin and enjoy the luxuries of a vacation. There is nothing quite like finding a new love on the island of Capri, but that is far from Lucie’s experience meeting George Zao. Off put by George’s eccentric, outgoing, and confident Chinese mother and George’s personality and lifestyle, Lucie wants nothing more than to distance herself from the Zao family after George kisses her. Even her cousin Charlotte does not approve of the match, so Lucie is forced to push him out of her mind. As fate would have it, George comes back into Lucie’s life after years apart. A few years older and somewhat curious about what happened between them, Lucie is intrigued by his reappearance yet does not want to get too close. She has a fiancé after all and would do almost anything to get the Zaos out of her life. After George and Lucie’s mothers become friends, it becomes even harder for Lucie to escape George’s presence, and her growing feelings for him. Her fiancé, Cecil Pike, is one of the richest new up and comers who she would be silly not to marry. It becomes ever so obvious of the differences between Lucie and her fiancé throughout the narrative through comedic scenes one can only read about. As she fights against George and her deepest desires, she becomes more perceptive to her insecurities of being Asian within a family of wealthy WASPs. Will she continue to feel the need to prove herself to her dad’s side of the family, or will she become more confident in her own heritage, career, and feelings for a man who she feels her family would not approve? This is another spin on a classic forbidden love story that intertwines two cultures, privilege, and money.