Books
August 18, 2008

The Street of a Thousand Blossoms
by Gail Tsukiyama
2007 St. Martin's Press
ISBN 13:978-0-312-27482-5
Book Review by Geni J. White

A history of Japan from before World War Two until the late 1960's, shown through the lives of two brothers, orphaned when their parents drowned and then raised by grandparents.

The war and the atomic bomb affected their futures and dreams, yet during a time of major changes in Japan, they persevered in traditional areas.  The older brother became Japan's top samurai while the younger brother became famous as a mask maker for traditional Japanese theater.

Their struggles intertwined with another family and with an older mask maker, in addition to neighbors and friends.  In spite of difficulties and sorrows, the brothers find contentment.

A well-written book with vivid descriptions that transport the reader to Japan and create a sense of involvement with each character.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews

Books
July 20, 2008

Sword and Blossom:  A British Officer's Enduring Love for a Japanese Woman
by Peter Pagnamenta and Momoko Williams
2006 Penguin
ISBN 1-59420-089-0
Book Review by Geni J. White　

History suggests that Japan, from the Meiji Period (1868-1912) onward fought to control all Asia, 'wishing to rid near-by nations of Western influences.'  However, an Anglo-Japanese Alliance for mutual defense, signed in 1902, lasted until the 1920's.

This alliance created a demand for British officers to know the Japanese language.  Arthur Hart-Synnot, of a landed Irish family whose forebears served the British army for five generations, volunteered to learn.  He arrived in Japan in 1904 and soon fell for Masa Suziki, a young woman of ordinary birth.

For decades Hart-Synnot's career often separated the couple.  He once begged Masa to marry him and join him in India.  Convinced by her family that she'd face terrible prejudice, she refused.

The couple, during forty years, wrote 800 love letters.  Arthur constantly expressed his longing for and devotion to Masa.  He stayed in the army to qualify for a decent pension for their later life together in Japan.

During the First World War, Hart-Synnot lost both legs in France. While recovering, he decided something that changed both their lives and that of their son.

Set in the culture and history of both Japan and the United Kingdom, this well-written love story ends strangely, sadly, but satisfyingly.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews

Books
June 15, 2008

Foreign Babes in Beijing:  Behind the Scenes of a New China
by Rachel Dewoskin
2005 W.W. Norton & Company
ISBN 0-393-05902-2
Book Review by Geni J. White

After graduating from college, Rachel Dewoskin wanted adventure, so accepted a job in Beijing with an American PR firm.  She soon received an unexpected interview as an actress for a Chinese TV show, not knowing the program was a soap opera.  During filming, she tried unsuccessfully to convince the director that scenes about American life were not culturally correct.

The twenty-two week TV program was shown many times throughout China and she soon found herself well known all over the nation.  Viewers never believed she wasn't like the TV character, Jeixi an American divorcee, but the Chinese loved and welcomed her anyway.

During her five years in Beijing, Dewoskin, a woman of intelligence and curiosity, often questioned and examined cultural behaviors. Eventually she realized that some relationships could not cross the gap between American and Chinese friends her age.

The book portrays life for some ex-patriot Americans, Russians, Arabs and others, living among Chinese young people.  The author and her companions experience fun times and sorrowful events, too.  She eventually returned to the US to study writing in graduate school. Dewoskin learned well and readers will feel personally present with her in Beijing as they read this book.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews

Books
May 31, 2008

Empress Orchid
by Anchee Min
2004, Houghton Mifflin Co.
ISBN 0-618-56203-6 
Book Review by Geni J. White

From a royal Manchu family of the Chiing dynasty, but raised as a poor country girl, this beautiful, highly intelligent teenager became the favorite concubine of a weak emperor who realized he could not solve China's overwhelming problems.

Living in the Forbidden City, Orchid realized arrogant rulers blindly believed no other nation surpassed or could ever conquer China. Most of the court was caught in the bondage of rituals that prevented them from accepting truth.

During the emperor's final years and his death Orchid assumed power, keeping her role mostly hidden, to save the throne for her young son.  However, many noblemen and other concubines conspired against her.

The author brings life in the Forbidden City so vividly alive that a reader feels present in court observing daily life, intrigues, friendships, enemies and dangers, set among magnificent opulence.

This book portrays Orchid's life and the Forbidden City during the late 1800's and early 1900's.  The story ends with the final burial of her emperor husband, as China's losses to Britain, France, Russia and the US grew.  However, she ruled for forty-six more years.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews

Books
May 8, 2008

Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World
by Jack Weatherford
2004, Three Rivers Press
ISBN 0-609-80964-4
Book Review by Geni J. White

The New York Times says of this Best Seller:  "The startling true history of how one extraordinary man from a remote corner of the world created an empire that led the world into the modern age."

The author, a professor of anthropology, writes a vivid account of a man I'd always heard brutally destroyed nations and cities. Apparently Genghis Khan won more battles through speed and psychological warfare than actual torture and mayhem.

Based on new research Weatherford gives us an unexpected, griping story of Genghis Khan and his impact on our lives today.  A charismatic Mongol leader, he established universal religious freedom, opened roads for free trade zones and redrew the world's boundaries.  Many of his political and social concepts still influence modern life.

This Mongolian, an outcast as a young person, revolutionized thirteenth century warfare, ruled twice as much area and defeated more people then any other man in history.  His hundred thousand warriors conquered lands with over three billion population.

Following Genghis Khan's methods and directions, his son and grandson unified China.  Nations such as India and Korea whose boundaries Genghis created still exist almost as he designed them.

Genghis Khan impacted the world in amazing and positive ways. History buffs and anyone who likes accounts of adventure will enjoy this book.  A volume well worth reading.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews

Books
April 9, 2008

The River at the Center of the World:  A Journey up the Yangtze and Back in Chinese Time
By Simon Winchester
1996, 2004 Picador (Henry Holt Press)
ISBN 0-312-42337-3
Book Review by Geni J. White

Winchester fulfills his dream of traveling 3,900 miles from the mouth of the Yangtze River at the East China Sea to its source in Tibet.  His guide is a Chinese woman whom, for safety reasons, cannot be identify to readers.  She helped him in unusual ways, including bullying bureaucrats who tried to hinder their trip.

This author occasionally talks about ancient Chinese men, but more often relates interesting historical events about British and other foreigners along the route.

He credits one small mountain in one Western province for rerouting the Yangtze northward by several hundred miles, turning its path across China toward Shanghai.  Without that mountain's block, the Yangtze would flow to the ocean in Vietnam.  Winchester believes this little known mountain deserves credit for the Yangtze's major impact on all of China.

He discusses life on the entire river, the sad, the ugly and the good, and also pros and cons of the Three Gorges Dam.  His view of the Chinese government is worth chuckling over.

This well-written, informative story easily holds reader's interest.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews

Books
April 1, 2008

Chasing the Dragon
by Roy Rowan
ISBN 1-59228-218-0
2004 The Lyons Press
Book Review by Geni J. White

Rowan worked in China from 1946 to 1949 while Mao and Chiang Kia-shek battled each other for control of that nation, after the Japanese were defeated and left the mainland.  Rowan first delivered relief supplies for UNNRA and eventually fulfilled his dream to be a full-time journalist.  He wrote for Time-Life and later, Fortune. His lively accounts of those years bring readers into the scenes.

Rowan investigated the evolution and effects of this Chinese civil war that ended with the Communist take-over and Chiang's flight to Taiwan, along with hundreds of tons of Chinese gold and treasures.

An easy to read, gripping story of an important time, this book helps the reader understand the beginnings of today's China.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews

Books
March 17, 2008

A Bull in China:  Investing Profitably in the World's Greatest Market
by Jim Rogers
ISBN 978-1-4000-6616-2
2007 Random House
Book Review by Geni J. White

Books
March 13, 2008

Shutting Out the Sun:   How Japan Created its Own Lost Generation
by Michael Zielenziger
ISBN 978-1-4000-7779-3
Vintage Books/Random House
Book Review by Geni J. White

Having lived in Japan for many years, Zielenziger, a Pulitzer Prize finalist for investigative news reporting and a Berkeley Visiting Scholar, writes about that country's economy.  Japan seemed set to be a world leader until a 1990's recession, from which the country has not recovered well.

The author examines Japan's culture, its resistance to change and its general lack of trust and altruism.  He talked with some of more than two million young adults who no longer add to the population or to the economy.

This book compares Japan and South Korea, looking for differences as to why Japan has fallen behind and why South Korea has expanded economically.  Zielenziger, a non-religious man, says the only apparent difference stems from the Korean involvement in Christianity, which gives people a hope and an energy that the Japanese people lack.

A fascinating, easy-to-read book, because so many personal stories are included.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews

Books
February 10, 2008

Game Over:  How Nintendo Zapped an American Industry, Captured Your Dollars and Enslaved Your Children
by David Sheff
ISBN 0-679-40469-4
Random House, 1993
Book Review by Geni J. White

Game Over tells the inside story of how some international businesses operate, succeed and/or fail.  The book also deals with a period of anti-Japanese phobia in the USA, probably fueled by competitors who lost out to the Japanese company, Nintendo. These companies filed numerous lawsuits that Nintendo eventually won.

To ensure quality, Nintendo strongly controlled licensees who produced games for their various game playing equipment.  Nintendo founders and presidents knew poor quality was a path to failure.

Even today, fifteen years later, I suspect similar quality controls help Nintendo produce games and game consoles sought by adults and children around the world.

Written as interestingly as a fiction thriller, Game Over is well worth reading IF you can find a copy.  I looked for weeks before locating a dog-eared copy in a university library.  On the Internet, used copies in good condition sell for US$93.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews

Books
January 15, 2008

China Road:  A Journey into the Future of a Rising Power
by Rob Gifford, NPR Correspondent
ISBN 978-1-4000-6467-0
Random House 2007
Book Review by Geni J. White

Gifford's interesting book reads as if he were talking to friends about his 3,000 km backpack trip on Highway 312 (Old Silk Road) from Shanghai to Kazakhstan.  On the way, he meets hundreds of ordinary Chinese and minority people.  He listens to their life stories.  He adds his ability for investigative reporting to the views of people he met, about whether China can become a fully developed country and world power. He gets upset about injustices, corruption and poverty.

In his last chapter, Gifford summarizes the pros and cons of what he learned.  He seems convinced that China's political history will not change, which will eventually limit progress.

He also analyzes views on whether China will take over Taiwan or not.  One reason he thinks the two countries may join...thousands of Taiwanese businessmen own factories and businesses on the mainland.  That could make uniting with China an inevitable and natural process.

If you read only one book about China, I recommend China Road.  You can gain a sense of that nation's historical pulse, its present problems and recent astounding growth.  Gifford also considers China's possible future.

© 2008 Geni J. White

A Candle in the Dark:  Book Reviews