...Gene Yang was also signing at the First Second booth. Advance copies of his AMERICAN BORN CHINESE were on hand, not for sale until this September. That didn't stop everyone from wanting their own...

From Gene Yang — who saw someone in this actual costume, blending different strands of pop culture...

American Born Chinese, my latest graphic novel, consists of three distinct storylines. The first retells the story of the Monkey King, an ancient Chinese folk hero who is ubiquitous in Asia.

Here's my version:

Like most Chinese children, I first heard the Monkey King's exploits as bedtime stories from my mom. Almost before I started drawing comics, I knew I wanted to do a comic book adaptation of the Monkey King.

But as I became more and more familiar with the character, there seemed to be less and less of a point in doing so. There were already so many Monkey King comics that he's practically his own genre. The popular manga series Dragonball Z is a riff on The Journey to the West. Heck, even Osamu Tezuka, Japan's God of Comics, did his own interpretation. What new insight could I possibly bring to the character?

I eventually came up with the idea to use the Monkey King as a lens through which to reflect on my own experience as an Asian-American. As I began writing the script, however, I realized that this would necessitate one drastic change to the original story.

At its heart, The Journey to the West is a Buddhist morality tale. In the original, the Monkey King raises havoc among the gods of all other traditional Chinese religions, and it is only the Buddha that is finally able to put him in his place. In American Born Chinese, I've replaced the story's Buddhist underpinnings with Christian ones, drawing from my own faith.

Christianity, you see, lies at the very center of my identity as an Asian-American. I would even go so far as to say that Christianity is a vital part of "The" Asian-American experience. For proof, simply visit a Christian student group on any university campus. More likely than not, you'll find a sea of Asian faces. By adopting this ancient Western religion that is both a part of and at odds with contemporary Western culture, we attempt to make sense of ourselves.

But is it okay for me to take an age-old Chinese folk tale and rip out its Buddhist heart? Derek Kirk Kim, one of my best friends and a decidedly non-Christian Asian-American, questioned me on this after an enthusiastic reading of my script. "How would you feel if someone took one of your stories and made it Taoist or Muslim or atheist?" he asked.

It's a good question. And after much reflection, I've arrived at an answer:

I've read that many scholars believe the Monkey King himself was derived from Hanuman, a Hindu monkey-god. The original author (or authors — no one really knows for sure) of The Journey to the West took the Hindu source material (perhaps without knowing it) and used it for his (or their) own religious purposes. Furthermore, coincidence or not, this trickster monkey deity is echoed in religions and mythologies all over the world.

So in a very real sense, the Monkey King is universal. He's been around a long, long time, and I think he's sturdy enough to follow us wherever we go, to embody whatever philosophies and beliefs we arrive at.

To be honest, I'm not entirely comfortable with that answer. But I was comfortable enough with it to be able to finish American Born Chinese, and maybe that's all that matters.

The second storyline in American Born Chinese follows the trials and tribulations of Jin Wang, a Chinese-American boy growing up in a white suburb:

Finally, the true face of racism, especially in as diverse a community as the San Francisco Bay Area, is much more complex than what is portrayed in the story. For instance, my most consistent childhood tormentor was an East Indian classmate. We hurled racist insults at one another with a determined ferociousness, usually in front of a white audience.

There is one race-related grade school memory that burns with particular intensity. A Chinese immigrant boy a year younger than I began attending my school, and the teachers on yard duty kept pestering me to befriend him. "You speak the same language," they told me. "You can really help him out."

I didn't want to be friends with him. I didn't want to from the deepest parts of me, for reasons I didn't understand at the time. He followed me around the playground for several days, and only stopped when my best friend and I threw tanbark at him.

Some folks who've flipped through American Born Chinese have asked about the star of the third storyline, Cousin Chin-Kee.

Several years ago, just before my wedding, I spent an afternoon organizing things in my childhood bedroom. I came across an old notebook filled with gag cartoons I drew in second grade.

Here's one example:

I've been told that Jeff Smith, the genius behind the cartoon epic Bone, first created Fone Bone and Company in kindergarten. In many ways, Cousin Chin-Kee is my Bone. He's a character conceived in childhood who's stayed with me ever since, consciously or not.

American Born Chinese is an exploration of WHY Cousin Chin-Kee is my Bone. And just as Fone Bone now looks much the way he did in Jeff Smith's kindergarten sketches, so Chin-Kee's current design remains consistent with that initial second grade drawing. I've got to stay true to the source material.

There is always the danger, of course, that by making a comic book about Cousin Chin-Kee I'm helping to perpetuate him, that readers — especially younger readers — will take his appearance in American Born Chinese at face value. I think it's a danger I can live with. In order for us to defeat our enemy, he must first be made visible. Besides, comic book readers are some of the smartest folks I've ever met. They'll figure it out.