The Joy Luck Club is about four Chinese mothers, who came to America when they were young, and their grown daughters who were born in the United States. The mothers formed a club, where they play a Chinese tile game, eat a lot of food, and talk about life. Their stories about their youth in China are both sad and magical. The moms are filled with old-fashioned wisdom, while their daughters' lives are more modern and involve complications their mothers never dreamed of. Because they have different ways of looking at the world, the mothers and daughters often don't see eye-to-eye, but there is a strong bond between them. Told from different points of view, the wisdom in this novel plays out in stories of love, hope, desire, and loss.