Samenv.: Peony is set in the 1850s in the city of Kaifeng, in the province of Henan, which was historically a center for Jews. The novel follows Peony, a Chinese bondmaid of the prominent Jewish family of Ezra ben Israel, and shows through her eyes how the Jewish community was regarded in Kaifeng at a time when most of the Jews had come to think of themselves as Chinese.
Samenv.: A young woman is sold into a rich Chinese-Jewish household and scandalizes tradition by falling in love with the family's only son.

Pearl Buck at her sloppiest is still Pearl Buck (and this at least isn't _Mandala_). Anachronisms abound, some of them quite outrageous to someone who knows Chinese history (and not entirely surprising if you know Buck's distinctly populist ideas about the proper role and form of fiction), and several characters feel ever so slightly recycled (the titular serving girl Peony is apparently putting in a return appearance from _A House Divided_, in which she married a somewhat fictionalized Zhou En-Lai), but Buck's psychological insight is as exact as her everything else is sloppy. Don't prioritize this over _The Good Earth_, _Pavilion of Women_, or _Sons_, but don't write it off as worthless either. ( )

Jews--China--Fiction.

This book is about a Chinese/Jewish family in China and the life of Peony, their bondmaid. It is informative on the lives Jews in China during the time when the old ways are starting to fade away. The family lives in K'aifeng, the home of the largest Jewish colony in China. Peony tells the family's story from a Chinese point of view, and how the problem of assimilation into Chinese life effects each family member. A well written book. If you have any interest in Jews in China this is worth a read when you are looking for a fictional novel. ( )

adult fiction, China, family life, Jewish life, diaspora ( )