Wild Swans Jung Chang
The story of three generations of women from one chinese family , Wild Swans begins at the end of the 1800's with concubines & footbindings & goes on to cover among other things the Boxer Rebellion, Cultural Revolution & the death of Mao.
What i liked about the book was that i learnt an awful lot about what life was for most people under communism something i knew very little about. I did however find this quite a difficult read because it was so harrowing . Communism while sounding wonderful in theory when put into practise caused such devastation & hardship & Mao's increasingly bizarre demands of his people, tearing up grass because it was bourgeios & spontaneous loyalty dances round statues of Mao waving the little red book would be laughable if they hadn't caused such suffering. So did i enjoy the book, yes & no, i thought it was definitely a worthwhile read as i learnt so much about life in China under Mao's rule but i did find it unrelentingly depressing .
4/6