Worth Fighting For

 

Rating: 3 out of 5 | A Mulan-esque tale, so no real surprises, but this is a quick, fun read.

My Thoughts:

This is the perfect "fake it till you make it" tale between two characters who are pretending to be something they are not. When Fa Mulan's father is ill right before a very lucrative deal is happening, Fa Mulan uses her father's name to trick the family into thinking that she is the one that has been corresponding with Shang. The Chinese name seems to have no gender, so she can sort of get away with it until this very patriarchal company tests her at the family ranch based on her father's correspondence.

This is a familiar trope - mistaken identity, the test, the love interest. There are no surprises here, except that Sutanto provides a window for readers who want to see more like Crazy Rich Asians. The author provides a familiar story in a contemporary setting with characters who usually do not take center stage. That alone is worth selling to high school students.  

From the Publisher:

As the right hand of her father’s hedge fund company, Fa Mulan knows what it takes to succeed as a woman in a man’s world: work twice as hard, be twice as smart, and burp twice as loud as any of the other finance bros she works with. So when her father unexpectedly falls ill in the middle of a critical acquisition, she is determined to see it through. There’s just one hitch: the family company in question is known for its ultra masculine whiskey brand, and the brood of old-fashioned aunts, uncles, and cousins who run it—lead by the dedicated but overworked Shang—will only trust Mulan’s father, Fa Zhou, with the future of their business.

Rather than fail the deal and her father, Mulan pretends she’s Fa Zhou. Since they’ve only corresponded over email, how hard could it be to keep things moving in his absence?

But the email leads to a face-to-face meeting, which leads to an invitation to a week long retreat at Shang’s family ranch. One meeting she can handle, but a whole week of cattle wrangling, axe-throwing, and learning proper butchering techniques, all while trying to convince Shang’s dubious family that this young woman is the powerful hedge fund CEO they’ve been negotiating with? Not so much—especially as she finds it harder and harder to ignore the undeniable spark between her and Shang.
Can she keep her head in the game and make her father proud, all while trying not to fall into a trough, or in love with Shang?

Publication Information:

• Author: Jesse Q. Sutanto
• Publisher: Hyperion Avenue
• Publication Date: June 3, 2025
• Print length: 288 pages