Thank you for allowing me to review this book. I had been recommended this author by a friend, however, im afraid I struggled with this story. Initially, I quickly got into it and enjoyed how Joan settled into California after growing up in Taiwan. However, towards the middle I found the story developing too slowly and I struggled to complete the book.

This is a terrific family saga, one that largely focuses on Joan, a Taiwanese woman living in California. Even though I have read it is comparable to the work of Anne Tyler, I think this is inaccurate. Where Tyler has a specific style and often writes very concisely about family, Wang does something quite different. It is hard to qualify what, exactly, but by reading 'The Satisfaction Cafe', one will know.

The novel starts with Joan doing something awful to Milton, her first husband. What follows is a journey through her life, from meeting Bill, becoming pregnant with Jamie, then adopting Lee soon after, through to Bill's death and her own decline into memory loss. The cafe in the title is something that makes Joan's life complete and it is lovely to see how much pleasure it gives her, as well as how it impacts positively on so many others.

I love the way that Wang writes expansively and with great scope - this covers one woman's complete life, really. However, having said this, she doesn't dwell on life's minutiaes and I really like how assumptions are made - and rightly so. An example is when readers learn about Joan's memory loss - but it is never explicitly said what is wrong with her. There are some jolts in this novel but they are well-placed.

I recommend this novel - and thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.

Spending quality time with Joan: resourceful, pragmatic + delightful 4.5 rating

Born and raised in Taiwan, Joan’s destiny, as far as her parents are concerned are to not cause trouble, take care of her family and make a respectable marriage. She was not meant to go to America, and get education. Money for that was for sons, not for a daughter. However, it happened that the sons did not fulfil as they should, so going to America to make the funds to send back home became Joan’s responsibility

And, initially she did as she should, including marrying a Chinese man, This proved to be a big mistake, as he was a bad man, However, in the eyes of her parents, leaving her violent husband, and getting a divorce was the shameful thing.

Wand tells Joan’s story with humour and kindness, and the reader comes to love and appreciate Joan as much as her author clearly does. The comparison to the kind of relationship Anne Tyler has with her characters is very true. There is an equal generosity, authenticity and warm appreciation, a seamless mingling of humour and engagement with the slings and arrows life brings

Joan is a natural carer for others, but she is also a woman of spirit and fortitude.

The café of the title is something Joan creates for herself and others, towards the later part of her life, when various events have happened. It’s a charming place, where people with listening and communication skills, of many kinds, from all walks of life engage with lonely customers. Not with any salacious or sexual agenda, even though the initial springboard of the idea came in Joan’s mind from geishas, and Japanese culture.

This was a thoroughly delightful read. Kathy Wang has brought into being such an admirable, quirky woman, a real pleasure to spend time with – and with the community she gathered around her. A feelgood read, without mushy sentimentality, because Joan herself is not sentimental or made of marshmallow!

Lovely cover and a great title, but misleading in that I felt the cafe didn't happen for ages and then was more like an add-on than the actual narrative - I'd have liked to get to know the stories behind the customers and the staff. That said, I did like reading about Joan and how she sailed through her very interesting life.

Subtle, wonderful and multi layered. Wang follows her main character, Joan through her marriage to Bill and beyond. Many characters are weaved into the story and their characters become a part of it - just like the Satisfaction Café.

An interesting concept, mostly executed well.

I liked Joan, thought she was an interesting character with a great story. I found her kids likeable too, but the rest of the family she married into were mostly vile, Theo? ugh!

I thought the title was a bit misleading as that part didn't happen until quite some time into the book and the time jumps were not laid out clearly so I was confused about the ages of people at times.

Generally though, an entertaining family saga, full of drama and tension.

A really enjoyable read, watching Joyce as she navigates her way through marriage, divorce, childbirth, tragedy and love.

A woman’s journey to change her destiny through marriage…

The beginning felt a bit heavy for my taste, and at first, I honestly thought this book might not be for me. There wasn’t much dialogue early on, so it felt a little dull. But then, one night, I picked it up again, and something changed. Suddenly, it was more than just a heavy story. It pulled me into a world of grief, frustration, and the quiet struggle of simply being a woman.

The café in the story is a dream. I love to imagine that maybe, just maybe, a place like that exists in real life. a little spot where people come and go, learning about life through the stories strangers share over coffee.

This is a story for the woman who’s been betrayed by life but keeps going. For the mother who always has her children’s backs, no matter what. For anyone who’s felt unseen and still chooses to rise.

Thank you little, brown book group UK and netgalley for this early copy. All opinions are my own.

Joan comes to the States from Tai Pei. Working hard at college, she strives not only academically but also to find her place in society. Falling for a handsome Chinese man, she marries Milton and believes she has reached what everyone around her seems to be striving for, only to hit a roadblock almost immediately. Joan's solution to her marital problems is liberating and a breath of fresh air. It sets the tone for the rest of this novel, which follows Joan through the whole of her life. Beautifully written, engaging and at times very funny, I really didn't want this to end.

The Satisfaction Cafe reads like a fictional memoir of the main character Joan’s quiet, ordinary life—which somehow felt anything but ordinary. There’s something deeply moving about the way the story unfolds: slowly, gently, and with emotional honesty. It reminded me of books like Stoner or Elizabeth Strout’s novels, but this one felt more intimate and tender.

As a woman, I saw parts of myself in Joan—her relationships, her choices, her quiet strength. The writing is deceptively simple, but there’s so much depth here if you take the time to read slowly and really sit with it. It’s not flashy or dramatic, but it lingers in your mind.

Also, the cover is absolutely stunning, elegant and perfectly matched to the tone of the book. I truly hope this novel gets the attention it deserves.

There are so many unexpected layers to "The Satisfaction Cafe" that I couldn't predict having only read the marketing description.

As readers, we follow the protagonist's, Joan, nearly entire life story. From her upbringing in Taiwan and adverse experiences that are mentioned almost in passing, through her first marriage and then the second one and the experience of motherhood and up to her end of life decisions. It's what I would call a gentle read, even though the many events in the story are far from being gentle.

There's so much strength in the fragmented story that only takes the readers through some part of Joan's life (as well as lives of her family) that invites us to fill in the gaps by ourselves.

There have been lot of comparisons to Ann Patchett or Elizabeth Strout - the detailed look at a person's life and the intricacies that form their world view - and while Wang's writing definitely fits in that school, it's also uniquely her own. She writes the characters with a lot of distance, so it's difficult to get into how they feel about things sometimes, but overall I enjoyed learning about Joan and her family

4.5! Subtle and deep study of family ties, from Taiwan to California. A strong woman's journey leads to a café where people find themselves through conversation.

The Satisfaction Cafe
by Kathy Wang

You might think this story is going to be set in a café, and looking at the absolutely gorgeous cover, you'd be forgiven for thinking that, but actually the café is so tangential to the main narrative, it's a puzzling choice for the title.

The first 20% of this story really captured my imagination. It describes Joan as such a ballsy character I felt sure we were going to have a lot of fun with her. Her deft handling of her first husband felt like foreshadowing, however she soon settles into a boring life of wifedom to a much older, much wealthier man, and the Joan I was eager to read about collapses into herself.

There are lots of cute moments in this tale of immigrant-made-good, but it's difficult to discern what the message is. I think it's supposed to be about being true to yourself, but that's so contradictory to how Joan is presented at first.

I think it's trying to say so much, it's failing to say anything coherently.

It is, however, a nice easy read, cosy and cute, which I'm sure many readers will appreciate.

Publication date: 26th June 2025
Thanks to #Netgalley and #LittleBrownBookGroup for providing an ARC for review purposes.

This is effectively the story of Joan’s Lifexas she moves from Taiwan to America for her education . It moves through the ups and downs she experiences throughout her lifetime her loves , losses and family. Told from various aspects

Kathy Wang's " The Satisfaction Cafe" came to me via a netgalley proof, thanks Little Brown and immediately drew me in with every page. 

Wang's writing and the composition of the  novel reminded me a lot of Ann Pratchett's  or Anne Tyler's work as Wang portraits the seemingly unexcited life of Joan Liang's:  from being the unimportant,  yet intelĺigent Taiwanese daughter who got lucky to become a Stanford student, to marrying husband no 1 who we know on page 2 will not survive that marriage.  Marriage no 2 to wealthy, older Bill is the true turnaround in Joan's life with many unexpected developments. I really became very fond of Joan as a character, her resilience through all the curveballs life throws at her, her love for Bill and motherhood until finally realizing her dream at a late stage in her life. Really loved Kathy Wang's excellent writing and this moving story.

I am really glad that I was invited to read "The Satisfaction Cafe" by Kathy Wang as it could have easily passed me by. It's not my usual type of book that I would pick up but I have been enjoying Anne Tyler and Elizabeth Strout books recently and this falls easily into a similar category. Quietly understated, about everyday people and life. You really get to know Joan as the book follows her entire adult life from when she leaves Taiwan for California and what happens in her two marriages. A lovely read!

In this quietly introspective book, we follow Joan for pretty much her whole adult life from the moment she moves to America from Taiwan.

Joan is quiet, shy and easily influenced at first, leading to a disastrous marriage to Milton.
She then meets Bill, an older wealthy man, and enters a marriage with him. Of course, her being of Chinese descent immediately sparks the stereotype that she married Bill for money and status. Despite her detractors, Joan begins to make a life for herself and Bill, and even starts to endear herself to his friends and some of his family.

But not all is rainbows and sparkles in Joan and Bill’s marriage, she begins to see his true character emerge over time.

The overall thread running through the book is the idea of satisfaction. In life, in love, in financial matters and so on so forth... How satisfied are we truly? Are we obsessed with achieving satisfaction? Could we release ourselves from the grip of specific insidious thoughts by releasing them somehow?

This book sinks its teeth in you from page one with a very compelling opening, and while the pace does slow down, I wasn’t once bored by it.

I found Joan to be an interesting character in that she seems to be an avoidant in some aspects of her life but is very present in other aspects. The contrast between her personality traits is insightful and astute. Everyone is after all some kind of walking contradiction.

Her relationship with her children, Lee and Jamie, was also a personal highlight. I enjoyed watching their lives unfold alongside hers.

The titular Café does not come into play in the story until much later, so maybe keep that in mind when you pick this book up. It is primarily the story of Joan.

Overall, a very solid character study with a great cast of characters and an opening you are unlikely to forget.

Thanks to Little Brown Book Group UK, Abacus, and NetGalley for the arc in exchange for an honest review

This novel was like a bustling cafe: so confident in its characters and adept at spanning the length of a life. It's propelled by an assured, kind protagonist whose complexities are obvious in the perspectives of others. It's not a novel with much interiority - we're told, rather than shown, what characters feel - but this didn't detract for me, instead making the story move quickly and smoothly. A lovely little gem. Thank you for this early copy!

Thank you to NetGalley, Abacus Books and Kathy Wang for sending me this ebook ARC - The Satisfaction Cafe is a beautifully written, quietly powerful novel and follows Joan Liang, who immigrates to California from Taiwan and starts her life in America from the attic of a house in Palo Alto, a place she could only afford thanks to doing chores for the widow who owned it. And then, she marries, and just six weeks later, stabs her husband.

That jaw-dropping opening hooked me instantly and sets the tone for a layered, surprising story.

Joan is a character you root for throughout, no matter the choices she makes or the relationships she navigates. The book spans two marriages with the first being dramatic and short-lived, the second longer and much more complex, as well as decades of parenthood, sacrifice, longing, and resilience.

What stood out to me most was how Joan always remained the emotional centre, even as the narrative shifted between the perspectives of those closest to her. I loved watching the dynamics of her family change, fall apart, and reconfigure around her.

Although it’s quite a slow-paced read, I never found it dull. A lot is unpacked without a lot happening in a traditional sense and yet, every chapter felt full. Kathy Wang captures the intricacies of family, the messiness of love, and the often invisible weight of expectations so beautifully. It explores how families come together and how sometimes, they just don’t.

And can we talk about the idea of the Satisfaction Café itself? Every town and city should have one; a place for everyone, no matter who you are, to sit with your doubts, your disappointments, your dreams, and just be.

This one will stay with me.