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Loading... Shanghai Girls (edition 2010)by Lisa See
Work InformationShanghai Girls by Lisa See
Women in War (33) » 12 more Best family sagas (79) Books Read in 2016 (1,717) Urban Fiction (34) Books Set in California (105) Asia (152) Loading...
Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. We follow two sisters as lives change from the war in China to becoming wives of two brothers in Los Angeles. Very compelling story. Well written. I really disliked this book and I'm extra disappoined about it because I loved Snow Flower and the Secret Fan so much! It starts out OK with the depiction of Shanghai but never did anything to make me feel a connection to the characters. Pearl is just pure, unadulterated grouch, and May is a completly selfish jerk (or is she? the last few pages make me wonder if she's fine but grouchy Pearl made me hate her!) Most of the book is just a boring list of things that happened. We worked at China City. We spoke Sze Yup. Sam had iron fan. Louie was mean. We did the husband-wife thing (what a super annoying term!) and Vern had melting-bone disease.(What was the deal with Vern anyway? Was he retarded, autistic, Down's Syndrome, just sickly, what?? He had no purpose at all except for the stupid model boats at the end.) The only exciting thing was when May FINALLY yelled at Pearl and told her to stop being such an in sufferable bitch! Not soon enough! I can't believe that there is a sequel because I can't imagine that people want to spend more time with these cardboard people. Somewhere between 3 and 4 stars. The beginning started off really strong and I was really invested in what happened though there was some really heavy, brutal stuff that happened. In the middle it started jumping around time-wise a bit more with less description and passing mentions of big events and that threw me off a bit. I do want to read the second in the series though.
Lisa See’s “Shanghai Girls” is much loftier than its cover art’s stunning portrait of beautifully adorned Asian women. The author of “Snow Flower and the Secret Fan” has written a broadly sweeping tale... Belongs to SeriesShanghai Girls (1)
Fiction.
Literature.
Historical Fiction.
HTML:NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A gifted writer . . . explores the bonds of sisterhood while powerfully evoking the often nightmarish American immigrant experience.”—USA Today BONUS: This edition contains a Shanghai Girls discussion guide and an excerpt from Lisa See's Dreams of Joy. In 1937, Shanghai is the Paris of Asia, a city of great wealth and glamour, the home of millionaires and beggars, gangsters and gamblers, patriots and revolutionaries, artists and warlords. Thanks to the financial security and material comforts provided by their father’s prosperous rickshaw business, twenty-one-year-old Pearl Chin and her younger sister, May, are having the time of their lives. Though both sisters wave off authority and tradition, they couldn’t be more different: Pearl is a Dragon sign, strong and stubborn, while May is a true Sheep, adorable and placid. Both are beautiful, modern, and carefree . . . until the day their father tells them that he has gambled away their wealth and that in order to repay his debts he must sell the girls as wives to suitors who have traveled from California to find Chinese brides. As Japanese bombs fall on their beloved city, Pearl and May set out on the journey of a lifetime, one that will take them through the Chinese countryside, in and out of the clutch of brutal soldiers, and across the Pacific to the shores of America. In Los Angeles they begin a fresh chapter, trying to find love with the strangers they have married, brushing against the seduction of Hollywood, and striving to embrace American life even as they fight against discrimination, brave Communist witch hunts, and find themselves hemmed in by Chinatown’s old ways and rules. At its heart, Shanghai Girls is a story of sisters: Pearl and May are inseparable best friends who share hopes, dreams, and a deep connection, but like sisters everywhere they also harbor petty jealousies and rivalries. They love each other, but each knows exactly where to drive the knife to hurt the other the most. Along the way they face terrible sacrifices, make impossible choices, and confront a devastating, life-changing secret, but through it all the two heroines of this astounding new novel hold fast to who they are: Shanghai girls. Praise for Shanghai Girls “A buoyant and lustrous paean to the bonds of sisterhood.”–Booklist “A rich work . . . as compulsively readable as it is an enlightening journey.”—Denver Post. No library descriptions found. |
LibraryThing Early Reviewers AlumLisa See's book Shanghai Girls was available from LibraryThing Early Reviewers. Current DiscussionsNonePopular covers
Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.54Literature English (North America) American fiction 20th Century 1945-1999LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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