Asia Books

Kevin Rushby has traveled extensively, and has written about his journeys with insight and tremendous empathy for people he has met. Children of Kali concerns his search for knowledge on the current state of the thug cult (murderous worshippers of the goddess Kali), and for one charismatic and well-known thug in particular. But the book does not read like some sort of true-crime or investigative work; rather, it takes the form of a travelogue, where Rushby learns about the parts of India he travels through, the types of people he meets. As such, although it develops at a slower or more leisurely pace, the work is deep and rich, and the reader feels he has learned not so much about the cult of Kali as gained somewhat of a new perspective on life. It was not exactly the type of book I was expecting, but I came to very much enjoy reading it.

This book deals with some very interesting, yet somewhat disparate topics. Rushby's travelogue/history was apparently inspired by his learning of the British colonial administrator Sleeman, who allegedly eliminated the thuggees from India. He travels across India to investigate the thuggees, but somehow mixes them up with Indian bandits, gangsters, and assorted mischief-makers. His biggest problem is his tendency to write in a stream-of-conscious style that is confusing. He jumps around from different places, to different topics, switches between travelogue, history, and commentary, without effectively transitioning and explaining himself. At times he refers to phenomena, places and people without any explanation of who or what they are. With just a little better writing and editing, this could have earned five stars.

I was expecting a much darker(creepy?) book from what I had read of the excerpt from the synopsis given by the bookstore. It turned out to be a very humorous travel log by Kevin Rushby's search of the Thug Cult. There are many entertaining encounters with the people in India, great descriptions of the food there, atrocious hotel rooms, the hustle and bustle of a very populated country - all a very informative and highly entertaining look of a Brit with a wonderful sense of humor travelling through ancient India. If you enjoy cooking or travel essays, this book's a keeper.

Anybody interested in Modern India, I urge you to read "Children of Kali" by Kevin Rushby from several points of views:

1. How we get what we seek:
Kevin went to India in search of thugs and decoits, while Maddy (a character in the book) went to India in quest of happiness. See what each one got, and how this simple concept of "we get what we seek" revealed to Kevin at Sangam.

2. Real history of modern times:
The history of north and central India during East India company, Raj and after wee hours of independence is not taught to us, Indians in schools as it should be. Read how Kevin unearths it.

3. Travelogue:
How we all have very similar experiences as Kevin had in India, except he logs it in a superb fashion.

4. Objectivity:
If you are from India (a non-resident Indian, like me), see the places you grew up from an objective eye. Not necessarily an English eye, but an eye of a just seeker, Kevin that is!

5. Style:
I absolutely love the modern style of story-telling that is weaved with real facts and ground-level research. Just to examine this aspect, the book is worth reading.

We chose China as our cross-cultural country to "visit" this year in conjunction with the up-coming Olympics. This was a great resource for me in preparing to teach about China, and with the lovely pictures, interesting to the students as well. I was especially pleased with the "free gifts"- the poster was a nice addition and I was able to use the CD pictures for writing promts for the students.

DK Eyewitness books are always great, but this one is special because I have so many Chinese students this year. They are not always able to tell me in English about China and I don't speak Chinese, but photographs and the short paragraphs which accompany them are helpful. Many of my Chinese students want to tell me about the Chinese mummies, or the terra cotta soldiers and other sights they've seen in China. It is helpful to communicate about everyday life there too. Now if only Eyewitness books reached out to cover Korea, Turkey and the Pacific Islands!

The price of this book is a bargain! Filled with hundreds of full color photos on large glossy spreads. Lots of Information in here about modern China...the country, nature, animals, food, money, art, families, language, government, etc. There is a big 4-color poster in the back of the book and a clip art CD included.

I bought this book because my daughters were born in China, and we have an interest in learning more. Since they are young, the colorful format and illustrations are great. And, there is a bonus CD of clip art, great for school reports or even scrapbooks. This book is not an in-depth study, however, but it does hit the highpoints very well.

This book is an extraordinary example of what is yet to come as more of Athenasius' works are uncovered and translated. This treatment is extraordinarily lucid and shares intimate glimpses of how this man lived his private life and shared his voracious curiosity with the world.

Charles Van Tuyl's translation of CHINA ILLUSTRATA is a literary piece of art. It provides the Modern reader in English with a powerful document through which to better understand East-West relations. It offers a thoughtful picture of "old China."

At last! Charles Van Tuyl's translation of Athanasius Kircher's "China Illustrated" reveals the finer nuances of a text almost 400 years of its time. This book not only shows how China appeared to the first European missionaries and travelers, but illuminates how the cultures of Europe and Asia influenced each other from the earliest times . . . most modern scholars and researchers are only beginning to understand these relationships.

Here we have the exposition of the life and times of a man who was one of the first to document the travels of westerners to the far east. Also one of the first authors who successfuly wrote about Buddism and Hinduism as actual religions without being burned at the stake for it ! An unpretentious translation of an author every bit the equivalent of Galileo or DaVinci. There are over 200 other titles to bring to print.

Lou, a young GI left his newly-wed wife Lottie for battle fields of India and China. He kept her connected and informed through his mailbag of sharp observation in words and talented artistic sketch so vivid that people described almost popped out from the pages. His letter never had a dull moment and was loaded with concise interesting background information so that his wife understood what he observed and felt culturally, politically and historically. He witnessed the reality from a far away modern country to war-torn nations without the arrogant and superior attitude. He saw the good, the bad and the ugly. Readers would easily comprehend the devastated China and the suffering of the innocent and helpless victims assaulted by the invading Japanese.
His smiling helpful attitude won him many friends. After the war, he promoted the friendship between American and Chinese people. Should he work for State Department, Asia history would have a different outcome. I had the fortune of sharing my love and respect to him by email in 2004. He related his 60th Wedding Anniversary honeymoon trip to China with wife Lottie to refresh his memory before he passed away last year.
I treasure his friendship and I feel we became bosom comrades by reading his book with cheering "Gan Bay" drinking party. Lou belongs to the Greatest Generation. My recommendation is that Lou's book should be classified as a must-read literature for the American idol generation to learn and carry on the mission of humanity, freedom and justice.

This book depicts life in China and India in such colorful and humorous ways. For a chinese-American who knows so little about China of the 1940s, it is a godsend. It helps me udnerstand the social, cultural, military, and economic aspects of life in China during that era. I feel very fortunate to have read and be in possession of this incredible book. It is without any doubt a collector's item for any WWII buffs.

China Mailbag: Uncensored, is a wonderful book. It drew me into the story because the book is made up of first person accounts of war, of the movements during WWII in China and India, and of the love an American GI had for his newlywed wife. The book is extremely interesting because it paints a detailed picture of what life was like for troops during WWII and contains a vast amount of entertaining anectodes, telling of funny meetings with chinese locals, and how difficult it was for soldiers to live the lives they were accustomed to in a foreign land. The book made me feel as though I too, had received letters from a GI abroad - the more of the book i read, the more i couldnt wait to turn to the next page. This is a book that any person, from young adults to fellow veterans of war would love to read. An entertaining, educational, overall lovely story is waiting for you! I encourage you to read it!

China Mailbag Uncensored-- a stunning book full of color, character, and the atmosphere of India, Burma, and China during World War 11. The story is told through the culture-shocked eyes of a young U.S. Army lieutenant as he writes illustrated letters to his bride at home. Punctuated with pictorial cartoons and picturesque art, this page-turning book takes the reader through experiences on a Jim Crow train as it races toward the Pacific to launch its soldiers on an adventure through submarine-infested waters to get to the China-India-Burma theater of war. The drama unfolds in the crowded streets of Calcutta, sweeps you across the Himalayan Mountains, and impresses upon you the scenes of war-torn China. Lou Glist, the artist-author, is there to join the Chinese in their fight against a Japanese foe who has conquered and occupied more than one-half of their country. Lou pictures starving soldiers, coolies carrying impossible loads, farmers working rice fields with oxen, Buddhist temples, hardships, disease, misfortunes, and life situations where there is no clean water, electricity, air conditioning, heating, and all the comforts of home. Imagine yourself in a strange land, living with people who have strange customs, a strange language, strange food, feeling the pain of anxiety, and laughing at yourself and your own reactions. If you do this, you will appreciate what this gifted , young soldier went through to give us a stream of human interest episodes on his odyssey of 18,000 miles. As you are drawn through this steady flow of observations, you will understand why these letters to Lottie are such an enduring treasure. You also will have a new appreciation for the sacrifice American soldiers, sailors, and marines made to give us global peace and prosperity today.

Among my favorite narratives in this anthology are; a Russian language teacher who married a Chinese man and the story of David and Isabel Crook.

Back when China and the USSR were best buds a language teacher came to China to teach Russian she fell in love with a Chinese man. They married and had two daughters. Everything was rosy until the Sino-Russian split.

David and Isabel Crook are two American Commies who defected to China for ideological reasons. David Crook was imprisoned during the Cultural Revolution as were other similar Americans like Sidney Rittenberg. I would have liked to know more about what prompted two seemingly ordinary Americans defect to a communist country and stay throughout the Cultural Revolution.

There are many good narratives, but these two are the most interesting and unique. I liked this one better than Macao Remembers. I also saw this book for sale in Hong Kong, in the traditional characters. By the way I lent one of my Chinese friends this book and she was somewhat skeptical of some of the stories.

`China Remembers' by Zhang Lijia and Calum MacLeod groups 33 contributions from Chinese and foreign residents in China, arranged to give insight into the history of the People's Republic and leavened with introductions to guide the reader through the complexities of its political campaigns.

It is hard to imagine an editorial team better equipped for the task. Zhang Lijia's metamorphosis from Nanjing factory worker to freelance writer itself reflects China's heady leap from planned economy to sink-or-swim capitalism. Calum MacLeod, who I have counted a friend since we shared a mouldy hotel room in Xi'an in 1989, earns his living bridging the gap between international investors and newly corporate China.

The testimonies this Anglo-Chinese joint venture couple have gathered come as an antidote to the efforts by Mao Zedong and his communist comrades to force the world's most populous nation to march to a single beat. China Remembers bursts with human contradictions and surprises a world away from the tyranny of Marxist class truths.

Have you ever wondered what life has been like since `the people of China stood up' in 1949? If so then ` China Remembers' is the book for you.

Cleverly constructed by husband and wife team it provides a highly readable personal account of the defining moments in the lives of a variety of people. By interviewing hundreds of people and eliciting their stories they have painted a rich and vivid picture of 50 years in China. The characters endear themselves to the reader as they tell their stories. People such as a Chinese soldier in the Korean War, a farmer who lost almost all her family in China's terrible famine, a red guard in Shanghai during the cultural revolution to a modern day self-made business tycoon and a village carpenter striving to win democratic election to his village committee.

But what adds immeasurably to the charm and interest of this book are the linking introductions to each section and chapter. Written in a different, more academic style, the authors have set the historical, political and economic scene so that the reader can more readily identify and empathise with the achievements and problems related by each storyteller.

This book entertains as it educates, makes you laugh as well as cry and as China continues to rejoin the world, it enlightens understanding of a mysterious, enigmatic yet wholly human people. A great read!

"China Remembers", a collection of individual eyewitness accounts from a wide variety of participants in the last 50 years of Chinese history, vividly and poignantly portrays the realities of those years.

Divided into five "periods" - from "Consolidating Power:1949-1956" right up to the present day with "Entering the World:1990-1999", each of the "periods"comes to life through the voices of such witnesses as diverse as an interpreter of Mao Zedong, a young woman's experience of the Cultural Revolution in the remote countryside,a student who participated in the 1989 "Beijing Spring", a legal expert who returned to her native China after 10 years in the US, and a rubbish collector...among the 33 different "voices" of this vivid volume. Each very personal account is preceded by the authors' introduction.

The voices from the heart recount the turmoil of recent Chinese history - of the often unspoken horrors and unfathomable personal tragedies. The recollections are told in the first person and dwell with courage upon the past experiences, struggles and success against all odds and the opportunities and hope for the future.

Authors Zhang Lijia - born and raised in China - and Calum Macleod have memorably captured the emotion, complexity and contradictions of China's recent history in a work that provides gripping reading.

Emily Hahn has been an author and journalist since 1929, when her first stories appeared in The New Yorker magazine. In 1935, she ran away to China in an effort to forget a failed romance and to find herself. By the time she returned home eight years later on a refugee ship, she was a changed woman. China to Me is the story of her life, loves, and adventures in China. It's a candid and unabashed account of her romance with a Chinese poet, her battle to overcome opium addiction, her torrid love affair with a married British intelligence officer (with resulting child out of wedlock), her friendship with the illustrious Soong sisters, and her experiences in occupied Hong Kong. China to Me shocked America and became a bestseller when it was published. Hahn is a gifted writer with an easy, entertaining style. What's more she's a bright, witty, and engaging storyteller. Readers who are unfamiliar with her writings (she wrote 51 books)will enjoy this book. It's a great introduction to the writings of a woman who was a feminist before the word even invented and who is--as one of my friends puts it --"a forgotten American literary treasure."

I am writing to notify all readers that Ms. Hahn passed away in February 1997. She is survived by her daughters, Carola Vecchio and Amanda Boxer, and her husband, Charles Ralph Boxer

I found this book on a coffee table at a lodge in a remote part of WA state. I'm ashamed to say, I enjoyed it so much I snitched it and took it home with me. This is a fascinating book about a brave woman. She is so familiar in her writing, I felt like I knew her personally and had to find out what happened to her family! Good Read!

As the adopted granddaughter of Emily Hahn and a co-founder of Bastard Nation, I was especially moved by reading my grandmother's brave, amusing and thought-provoking account of keeping her out-of-wedlock child (my mother, Carola).

For the next edition - if there is one - I would like to see Professor Chow discuss at greater length two related issues: trade and currency.

Since the middle of 2003, China has become America's third largest trade partner (America is China's second largest partner), replacing Japan, according to the US Dept of Commerce.

The issue of the renminbi (yuan) is a hot potato in this election year, as many American politicians are clamoring for a "free-floating" of China's currency (as a solution to America's jobless problem, trade deficit, etc.).

Professor Chow needs to deal with this issue. I've heard counter-arguments from some real heavyweights: David Eldon, the Chairman of the global banking giant HSBC, and 2 Nobel Laureates in Economics - Robert Mundell, the world's #1 expert on international currency, and Joseph Stiglitz, the former Chief Economist of the World Bank and Chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers. All three point out that fooling around with the renminbi now would destroy the world economy without doing anything to solve America's problems. The editors of Fortune, Forbes, and Business Week agree: Be careful what you wish for, because you may get more than expected.

My guess is, Professor Chow will take these issues apart with the same analytical and keen intelligence he addresses other issues related to China's economic transformation.

Chow's prediction (p. 102-3 & 384) that around 2020 China's GDP will be equal to that of the US in PPP terms is based on statistics from a World Bank study. I undertook a study of my own based on figures from the UN Human Development Report.

Here I assume that China's growth rate will be an average of 7% per year until 2020, and America's to be 3.5% per year until 2020. The 7% rate is achievable for China, which managed to maintain more than that in the past two decades (about 8.2% per year from 1975-2001). 3.5% for the USA may be on the high side though (America's annual growth rate: 2.0%, 1975-2001).

Starting from $5.112 trillion in 2001, China will have ballooned to $19.0012 trillion in 2020 (almost 4 times).

In the same period America will have grown steadily from $9.9289 trillion in 2001 to $18.9778 trillion in 2020.

(In 2019, the year before 2020, America will still be some $410 billion larger than China. For those who are curious, by 2025 China's economy will be some $3 trillion larger than that of the US: $25 trillion versus $22 trillion. $3 trillion is a lot of money today - almost the size of Japan's economy - but this is likely to be worth much less in 2025.)

Chow's projection is thus about right. In 2020, China and the US are worth $19 trillion each.

Interestingly, my calculations show that China's economy, valued at $5 trillion in 2000, will be about $10 trillion in 2010, $14 trillion in 2015, then again almost $20 trillion by 2020, and over $25 trillion in 2025 - essentially quintupling over 25 years. (If growing at 10% annually China - or any other country - could expand its economy by a factor of 8 in just 21 years! I think that's what happened to America after 1865.)

The per capita income of an average Chinese should at least quadruple from 2000 to 2025, provided the population growth rate is kept tightly under control. That brings a standard of living on a par with South Korea or Bahamas today. Already China's population growth is among the slowest in the developing world, lower even than America's.

All these figures are in PPP, in constant 2001 dollars. In nominal GDP America will likely remain larger than China long after 2025 unless there are changes in the exchange rates for the dollar and for the Chinese yuan in the meantime, which is possible.

Chow's calculations are thus correct. I've crunched the numbers from a different source and both projections match.

Of course, nothing ever happens exactly as predicted, especially in economics. Linear projections can look foolish in retrospect. Even with the best statistics, every projection can be delayed - or accelerated - by man-made and natural disasters. But this book does give us an idea of China's economic future.

Whether or not China or the US will be the world's largest economy after 2025 will depend on many factors, one of which will be the size and integration of the European Union.

This book provides a good deal of moderately valuable information about the Chinese economy. It also has large sections of what seem like pieces of an ordinary introductory econ textbook, which will be tedious to anyone who has taken an econ course without being terribly valuable to those who haven't. The book appears fairly thorough and objective, but not very imaginative or insightful.
One point he makes that I found worth remembering is to point out the similarities between Chinese state ownership of enterprises with U.S. University ownership of companies created to commercialize their research. In both cases the owning institution has a mission very different from commerce, but often allows the enterprise to function as a business. Alas, he doesn't explore the incentive structures that make this often work in China but create monopoly-style inefficiencies when most other governments own businesses.

Professor Chow is a distinguished economist who is an elected member of the American Philosophical Society and the former chief of econometrics at Princeton University. His statements carry some weight. The key point of this book may be summarized in this sentence: "Hence the Chinese economy can be expected to generate about the same real GDP as the US economy in 1998 PPP terms in 2020." (p.103)

In other words, China will be an economic superpower rivalling America in 20 years' time.

Barring an unforeseen disaster - like an asteroid from outer space or World War III - Chow's prognostication may turn out right. What does that mean? Well, China will be resuming its former position as an economic superpower which it has occupied throughout history.

The most surprising and controversial part is Chow's contention that China's population is too small (chapter 11). He considers a number of factors in making this odd point, including arguments by Malthus and counter-arguments by Mao, as well as a number of intangibles (like the higher number of intellectual elites available from a larger population base). I think he goes wrong here, because he doesn't seem to have considered one serious fact: most of China is neither arable nor habitable - virtually useless - large though the country may be. What's more, the amount of usable land is getting less by the day, due to desertification from the north. China is bone dry.

Customers who are wondering whether this book is worth the price to invest in would do well to reflect on China's importance on the world stage. China is one-fifth of humanity and is exactly equal to America in territorial size. China has the world's third largest stockpile of nuclear warheads. (The Pentagon believes China's stockpile will quadruple in the next decades fully in line with its economic expansion.) China has a highly developed rocket and ballistic missile technology, and has publicly announced its intention to be the world's third nation to launch astronauts into space (to be realized in late 2003). China is one of the top ten oil producing countries, with larger proven crude oil reserves than America's (the largest in the Fast East - much larger than Indonesia's). China's relations with Muslim countries are excellent, and is probably the only major power to be popular among people of that faith. China has the veto on the Security Council. The WTO recently reported that China overtook Britain in 2002 as the world's fifth largest trader in goods and services, after the US, Japan, Germany and France. If the EU is counted as one unit, China is now the fourth largest trader. And according to the CIA World Factbook, China's economy is already the second largest in Purchasing Power Parity (the fifth largest in nominal GDP), and at $6 trillion it is 13% of the world's total.

Now Chow is telling us that China's rapid growth rate is an average of 7% per year for the next two decades, which is by far the fastest among the major powers (about twice India's, three times America's, and more than four-five times Europe's and Japan's).

In short, China is already a giant today (hardly the "modest" country as described by Bill Emmott of the Economist). People like Margaret Thatcher, Jack Welch and Paul Wolfowitz are already predicting China's rise to superpower status. And the economic transformation taking place there, fully and professionally detailed by Chow, will make it much bigger still. On top of all these, China today is also interesting because it is the oldest civilization among the major powers (America, China, Britain, Russia, Germany, Japan) and by far the biggest of the surviving ancient civilizations: Mesopotamia (Iraq), Egypt, Palestine, Persia (Iran), China, India.

Of course, China's per capita income will remain relatively low for the foreseeable future, but given the size of its population China will be a superpower long before it achieves American levels of income and standards of living - a prospect that is beyond the timeframe of this book.

Overall this book is excellent - serious and credible, without being excessively technical. It fills a big niche, and meets the needs of students, journalists, businessmen, Western observers and analysts alike. All of us should pay attention to the most significant event of the late 20th century and early 21st - the transformation of China's economy - and this book is an authoritative guide. It deserves 6 stars out of 5.

The title of my review may seem odd but, after thinking about the subject of this book and reading it and others, I think you will agree with it. If you wonder how the nations of the earth who preach freedom and democracy all stop, kow-tow and do business with a Chinese government that manages to reap the profits of extreme Capitalist exploitation while using the apparatus of Stalin style Communist oppression, this book will show you how it began. One will notice in the excellent color illustrations that almost every Chinese soldier is armed with a better or equal quality weapon than his Japanese opponent. Unlike the French, the Chinese knew it was best to import the best weapons and learn to copy them(one soldier is shown using a crude but functional copy of a Tommygun, another with a perfect copy of a M3 submachine gun). The real problem was the fact that the Nationalist Army was still Feudal in nature with individual Army and Division leaders acting like Warlords and hording supplies and manpower for future use against political opponnents and having to be goaded into fighting the Japanese! The titular leader of this "army" Chiang Kai-Shek was the main practitioner of this strategy as he considered Mao Tse-Tung his real enemy and not the Japanese.This army shaped the world we live in today because it didn't fight against a clear foreign invader and was completely incapable of winning against a domestic one.

Very good book on little known subject. Information on uniforms and equipment was very good.

So finally there is an illustrated book about the National Revolutionary Army of the Republic of China... and the cover is of a Japanese soldier sticking his bayonet up some poor Nationalist soldier who promptly surrenders, all while someone dressed in Communist garb calmly watches on. If this image was chosen as the cover I can imagine what goes on inside... I'm sure there's nothing about the defence of Sihang Warehouse, Battle of Shanghai, Operation Ichigo, and the various battles that took place. Instead it is most likely filled with pictures conveying pretty much the same thing the cover does.

That being said, nobody has even bothered to do a book like this before, so a BIG kudos to the publishers (and authors) for that... Enough to make a 5, if not for the farcical cover. Therefore, this gets a 4.

I was undecided about which soldier had a rougher life--the Japanese, Soviet, or Chinese soldier. After reading Philip Jowett's "The Chinese Army," I'll vote for the Chinese soldier. One in four soldiers issued a blanket? The virtual lack of a logistics pipeline severely hindered the Chinese Army's effectiveness. What little trickled down to the soldier's unit was often stolen and sold by his officers. No wonder Mao won! China was in a state of civil war since the mid 1920's. Japan needed resources and saw a failed nation as ripe for the picking. After Japan exhausted itself in China, Japan declared war on the rest of the world and was utterly crushed--Chinese soldiers played an important role in that defeat. Afterwards, China resumed its civil war, with the Communists routing the Nationalists. That civil war continues today with the conflict over Taiwan.

"The Chinese Army" covers the Nationalist Chinese Army--and I am abusing the term "army." Most of the Nationalist army was a half-trained peasant rabble that would have felt at home in the 100 Years War. It astounds me that the Chinese managed to survive close to three decades of civil war--with nearly a third of that in a formal declared war against Japan. I'll have to look up the other Chinese army, Mao's.

Details on uniforms and equipment included a series of color plates that are worth the price of the book. The details on unit organization are sketchy--but then, Chinese Army organization was flexible to the extreme. This book is 48 pages long, a bit slimmer than other Osprey products--but then, the Chinese fought a "come as you are" war. Virtually all weapons were either imports or copies of foreign weapons. Uniforms ranged from ordinary peasent garb (and a sack for ammunition--the few cartridges available) to German-based uniforms for Chaing's personal divisions.

I have to respect these tough soldiers. The only thing harder than being a Chinese soldier was being a Chinese peasant.

This book is an invaluable resource for scholars and amateurs alike. The introductory essay orients the reader, and the photographs tell their own story.

The "reviewer" below this is clearly insane and/or has an ax to grind. As any of their Yale students could tell you, Spence and Chin are both world-class scholars whose passion is narrating the stories of modern China accessibly, entertainingly, and provocatively.

This is a fascinating story of the history of China of the last hundred years intelligently interwoven with 264 rare and entertaining photos that add a unique sense of reality to the history. The authors' in-depth understanding of key historical events in China during the last century, combined with the many well chosen photos interspersed throughout the text (some of a fairly grim nature), make this a much more readable and realistic history book versus the typical history book that usually contains just a few photos crammed together into a center section. This is an oversized 264 page book printed on high quality glossy heavy paper.

It's a surprisingly thorough and sophisticated overview of China in the 20th century for a book that at first glance looks primarily like a picture book. The text is outstanding in itself and the pictures quite original. I recommend it to those with a rudimentary knowledge of Chinese history.

Overall, I found this book to be very informative and fun to read. Being a UCSD student and taking many classes pertaining to Asia, I read many works by Spence. By far, I have enjoyed reading every one of his works. This particular book in my opinion is the best of Spence's works-- though he cooperated with another author. Spence's works is a testament to his ability to present fact in a dynamic way. In this case, Spence uses photographs to augment his work.

And concerning the individual from Grand Rapids, Missouri (2nd Review). This individual is thoroughly ignorant and racist to say that the Chinese people "lost the sense of dignity, creativity, and are still today refusing to advance their own country by isolating from the rest of the world." China has continually engaged in the free market arena since it opened up commercially in the 1980s. According to most experts, China has the fastest growing economy in the world. On another note, this individual fails to note that there is a level of corruption in every country. Yes, we Americans have seen our fair share of corrupt cops and politicians! Overall, this individual's remark does no justice for the merit of Spence's work, and is an unjustified insult to the Chinese community.

This book is totally awesome! I feel like I have a highly skilled Chinese art instructor right at the table with me. Ms Cameron learned from one of the best and now I am learning from one of the best. Like I said, totally awesome book!

This is a wonderful instructional book for anyone looking to begin the traditional art of Chinese painting. The author is a westerner who lived in China when she was young and was taught the techniques of painting by masters. Using her book is the next best thing to having an instructor by your side. Each technique is carefully explained and clearly illustrated in a way that makes learning fun and easy. Using this book should give you the skills and confidence desired on your way to learning the art of Chinese painting.

This book is excellent for beginers in chinese art and art in general. Taking you step by step from the beginning by illustrating the basic rules for strokes, techniques and compositions necessary for a well deveopled authentic piece of chinese art. Ms.Cameron shows you what to do and what not to do in a conversational manner that builds confidence. In a short period of practice i was very pleased with my progress. If i can do it any one can. Buy this book.

This book is excellent for beginers in chinese art and art in general. taking you from the beginning by illustrating the basic rules for strokes, techniques and compositions necessary for a well deveopled authentic piece of chinese art. Ms.Cameron shows you what to do and what not to do in a conversational manner that builds confidence. In a short period of practice i was very pleased with my progress. If i can do it any one can. Buy this book.