Shanghai Girls - Book Review
SHANGHAI GIRLS, BY LISA SEE
BOOK REVIEW
I. INTRODUCTION
A. Review
Lisa See is an American writer and novelist born in 1955 in Paris, and grew up in the Chinatown section of Los Angeles. Her great-grandfather left his village in China to immigrate in Los Angeles at the beginning of the last century. Although she is only 1/8 Chinese, she spent he childhood in the Chinatown of Los Angeles, and her familial background has given her roots in Chinese culture and has had a great impact on her life and work.
See is the author of the critically acclaimed international bestseller, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan; Peony in Love; Flower Net (an Edgar Award nominee); The Interior; and Dragon Bones, as well as the critically acclaimed memoir On Gold Mountain, and Shanghai Girls. Her first book, On Gold Mountain: The One Hundred Year Odyssey of My Chinese-American Family (1995), was a national bestseller and a New York Times Notable Book. The book traces the journey of her great-grandfather, Fong See, who overcame obstacles at every step to become the 100-year-old godfather of Los Angeles’s Chinatown and the patriarch of a sprawling family.
Her position in the Chinese-American community has given her awards and recognitions such as the Organization of Chinese Americans Women's 2001 award as National Woman of the Year.
Shanghai Girls traces the carefree life of two sisters that are opposites in every way, Pearl and May Chin, in the cosmopolitan Shanghai of 1937, and whose life turned upside down when their father, ruined, decides to sell them to some Chinese in California. Meanwhile, Japanese have invaded the country and bombs are falling on the country, and May and Pearl, from leaving and enjoying an upper-crust life in Shanghai, will both have to fight for their lives, going through pain and sacrifices to finally meet their destiny in America. They then settle in Los Angeles and try to integrate despite racism and anticommunism.
Shanghai Girls is about two
BOOK REVIEW
I. INTRODUCTION
A. Review
Lisa See is an American writer and novelist born in 1955 in Paris, and grew up in the Chinatown section of Los Angeles. Her great-grandfather left his village in China to immigrate in Los Angeles at the beginning of the last century. Although she is only 1/8 Chinese, she spent he childhood in the Chinatown of Los Angeles, and her familial background has given her roots in Chinese culture and has had a great impact on her life and work.
See is the author of the critically acclaimed international bestseller, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan; Peony in Love; Flower Net (an Edgar Award nominee); The Interior; and Dragon Bones, as well as the critically acclaimed memoir On Gold Mountain, and Shanghai Girls. Her first book, On Gold Mountain: The One Hundred Year Odyssey of My Chinese-American Family (1995), was a national bestseller and a New York Times Notable Book. The book traces the journey of her great-grandfather, Fong See, who overcame obstacles at every step to become the 100-year-old godfather of Los Angeles’s Chinatown and the patriarch of a sprawling family.
Her position in the Chinese-American community has given her awards and recognitions such as the Organization of Chinese Americans Women's 2001 award as National Woman of the Year.
Shanghai Girls traces the carefree life of two sisters that are opposites in every way, Pearl and May Chin, in the cosmopolitan Shanghai of 1937, and whose life turned upside down when their father, ruined, decides to sell them to some Chinese in California. Meanwhile, Japanese have invaded the country and bombs are falling on the country, and May and Pearl, from leaving and enjoying an upper-crust life in Shanghai, will both have to fight for their lives, going through pain and sacrifices to finally meet their destiny in America. They then settle in Los Angeles and try to integrate despite racism and anticommunism.
Shanghai Girls is about two