Magnolia Wu Unfolds It All

Magnolia Wu lives in New York City with her mother and father, who run the Bing Qi Ling Bubbles Laundromat. Magnolia’s only friend moved out of New York a while ago, and she expects to be spending her tenth birthday alone with her parents, watching them work. Magnolia’s mother and father must work long hours, and while most of Magnolia’s classmates are away on summertime holidays, Magnolia must stay in the hot city, entertaining herself as best she can at the laundromat.

Although Magnolia used to have a lot of fun at the laundromat when she was small, as she has gotten older, she has come to understand that other young people see the laundromat as a strange place—one that she should be embarrassed about. She has stopped playing the silly games she once played there, and she passes the time doing things like sculpting sharks out of dryer lint and pinning lost singleton socks to a bulletin board in hopes that their owners will return to find them.

To Magnolia’s surprise, a friend of her mother’s, Ms. Lam, has returned to the city, bringing her daughter Iris with her, and Magnolia’s mother has arranged for the girls to meet.