The Ping-Pong Champion of Chinatown
WINNER-INDEPENDENT PRESS AWARD
FINALIST-BOOK EXCELLENCE AWARDS
“If you’re reading my book, I’m gonna consider you my friend. It ain’t like you gotta meet me ’cause I’m kind of a bad influence, but if you keep me at a distance, you could probably be my friend.”
Buffeted by this cheery outlook, Gertie McDowell, a naïve young girl from Turkey Roost, Kentucky, pens her diary—a series of bizarre misadventures that take her from starring on a foot fetish site in Los Angeles to hustling bets as a mechanical bull rider in Texas. From serving a stint in West Virginia’s Alderson Prison, because she “trusted the wrong kind of fella,” to getting sold into white slavery. But perhaps her crowning mishap is seeking the ping-pong championship of San Francisco’s Chinatown—all while hiding out in the Witness Protection Program. A zany yet tender book that will have you laughing out loud.