A major new biography from the internationally bestselling author of Wild Swans, Mao and Empress Dowager Cixi- a gripping story of sisterhood, revolution and betrayal, and three women who helped shape the course of modern Chinese history.
Jung Chang is the internationally bestselling author of Wild Swans- Three Daughters of China; Mao- The Unknown Story (with Jon Halliday); and Empress Dowager Cixi- The Concubine who Launched Modern China. Her books have been translated into over 40 languages and sold more than 15 million copies outside Mainland China, where they are banned. She was born in China in 1952, and came to Britain in 1978. She lives in London.
Big Sister, Little Sister, Red Sister is a monumental work, worthy
both of Jung Chang’s Mao and of the great, rambling, heterogeneous
Chinese folk epics of the oral past, such as The Water Margin and
The Three Kingdoms. Its three fairy-tale heroines, poised between
east and west, spanned three centuries, two continents and a
revolution, with consequences that reverberate, perhaps now more
than ever, in all our lives to this day.
*Spectator*
Outstanding... As with her previous books, most famously Wild
Swans, it is Chang’s sympathetic, storyteller’s eye — her attention
to deeply human detail during the most extraordinary circumstances
— that makes her work remarkable. Big Sister, Little Sister, Red
Sister is another triumph.
*Evening Standard*
The Soong sisters were an extraordinary trio… Jung Chang has shown,
in books such as Wild Swans, her instinct for a compelling story,
and that instinct stands her in good stead here as she weaves her
way through the complex history of China from the 1880s to the
1970s… Well worth reading, in particular for the way it shows how
powerful women have helped to shape modern China. At a time when,
70 years after Mao’s victory, the country’s political leadership
contains almost no prominent women at all, that is a particularly
apposite message to hear.
*Sunday Times*
Chang is too deft a biographer to tell you how to think. The
sisters are sage and foolish, selfless and vain, brave and fearful,
loyal and treacherous... It is up to the reader to decide if the
Soongs are fairytale princesses or wicked stepsisters... The
sisters were divided by politics, united by love. Even as you
recoil from their actions, you are moved by their bond. In this
lucid, wise, forgiving biography Chang gives a new twist to an old
line. Behind every great man... is a Soong sister.
*The Times*
One of this autumn's biggest reads, it's an astounding story told
with verve and insight.
*Stylist*
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