An excerpt from Ed Lin's INCENSED

I don’t c a r e how much you hate your family; there are certain things that you just don’t do, and you certainly don’t do them during the goddamned Mid-Autumn Festival—the one time of the year where you’re all supposed to pretend to love each other.

Number one, you don’t lie to your family. If you don’t want to say something that you know will upset them, just don’t say anything. As a general rule, eat more, say less.

Number two, show gratefulness for the things your family does for you. Even if it doesn’t help you all that much, when, say, your cousin tries to give you advice about your music career, say thank you and try to do something nice in return, like leaving halfway-decent clues about your whereabouts when you run away with your gangster boyfriend.

Speaking of which, number three, don’t run away with your gangster boyfriend, especially when you’re only sixteen and your father—my uncle—is one of the most powerful f igures in the underworld of central Taiwan. He’ll come after you hard.

I’m a twenty-f ive-year-old man, so I know these things full well. I was raised properly and I am humble at my core. My little cousin Mei-ling, however, is of the younger generation of Taiwanese. She’s stubborn and ready to f ight for what she