I had never read anything by this author before so delighted to try.It did not dissappoint what an interesting era to read about, a story I knew nothing about.A really good fiction read.

"The Island of Sea Women" was a really interesting read and I enjoyed learning more about the history of Korea and the tradition of the female free divers.

The main conflict felt really human and I liked that there wasn't a right side. But the main draw of the story for me was to see how quickly life changed for these women during the 20th century and the consequences for their traditions.

I'm so glad that Lisa See chose to write about the haenyeo as I've been intrigued to learn more since reading an article about them last year. She really brings the women of Jeju to life and gives invaluable insight into life in a matrifocal society. The story is so beautifully told I want to eat it! I adore Lisa See's work and this is my favourite yet. As an author, See makes an important contribution to literature by providing historical and cultural context to the lives of the citizens of East Asia for those of us who are not well-travelled nor academics. Her work is truly a gift. My niece is an avid K-drama and BTS fan so I'm going to buy her this book for a bit of balance as soon as she's a little bit older.

One of the things I love about reading is that it gives me the opportunity to learn about places and cultures I would otherwise be likely to go through life knowing little or nothing about. Before reading Lisa See’s latest novel, The Island of Sea Women, I had never heard of the haenyeo communities of Jeju in South Korea, but now I have been enlightened!

The haenyeo, for anyone else who doesn’t know, are female divers who gather seafood such as abalone, octopus and conch from the waters surrounding the island of Jeju. The Island of Sea Women is narrated by Young-sook, a haenyeo whom we follow over a period of many years, from the 1930s to 2008. It’s a story of friendship and betrayal, war and suffering, and the importance of forgiveness – but most of all, it’s a fascinating study of a society of ‘sea women’ and how their way of life changes as the decades go by.

At the beginning of the novel, we see Young-sook joining her village’s diving collective, of which her mother is the leader, and starting to learn the skills she will need in her career as a haenyeo. Although she is excited about taking her first dives with the other women, she is also nervous about the many dangers lurking in the depths of the sea. Fortunately for Young-sook, she has a friend the same age – a girl called Mi-ja – with whom to share her experiences.

Mi-ja is the daughter of a ‘Japanese-collaborator’, at a time when Japanese colonists are disliked and resented across Jeju, but Young-sook loves and trusts her and is closer to her than to her own brothers and sisters. The friendship between Mi-ja and Young-sook endures through loss and tragedy and political turmoil, through marriage and motherhood, through times of peace and times of war, until the day comes when one of the women is faced with a difficult choice – and the decision she makes that day means that nothing will be the same again.

I enjoyed The Island of Sea Women, but it wasn’t always an easy or pleasant book to read – Young-sook and her family live through a very eventful and turbulent period of Korea’s history, including Japanese colonialism, World War II and the Korean War, and Jeju’s strategic location means it is often at the heart of the action. The most memorable part of the book for me was the section covering the ‘4.3 Incident’, the horrific massacre of protesters by police and government forces that took place in April 1948. Although I’d felt that for the first half of the book, the balance between fact and fiction wasn’t quite right and that we were being given a lot of information and detail at the expense of characterisation and plot, from the 4.3 Incident onwards, the story became much more compelling and the characters began to feel very real to me.

Lisa See writes so well about female friendships. Like Pearl and May in Shanghai Girls, Lily and Snow Flower in Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, and the three girls in China Dolls, Young-sook and Mi-ja have a special, unbreakable bond, yet they also go through some very dark and difficult times that stretch their bond to its limits. As I read, I kept thinking about how important perspective is; we only see things from Young-sook’s point of view in this novel, but had we been given Mi-ja’s side of the story it would have become a different book entirely.

The haenyeo culture is fascinating to read about and See weaves several of their myths, legends and proverbs into the story, showing us the importance haenyeo place on praying to the goddess of the wind and attending religious rituals led by their female shaman. It is in many ways a matriarchal society where the women are the ones who go out to work and provide for their household, while the men stay at home to look after the children. In the haenyeo community, the birth of a girl is welcomed as much as a boy because she will eventually be able to earn money and feed the family, yet it is only men who can perform the ritual of ‘ancestor-worship’ and who are allowed to inherit property.

I thought it was interesting that Young-sook’s husband is insistent that their daughters should be sent to school and given the same opportunities as their sons, while Young-sook, illiterate herself, can’t see the need for female education because it won’t be necessary for a life spent diving into the sea. There is logic behind her viewpoint, because when the story comes up to date in the 21st century, we see that with improvements in education, many of the island’s young women are leaving Jeju for less dangerous jobs on the mainland. Most of the remaining haenyeo are aged over fifty-five – and some are in their seventies and eighties, still spending hours each day submerged in cold water, holding their breath for more than two minutes at a time.

This book is primarily a book about friendship and how holding grudges can bring untold pain and suffering.  It is told in two timelines.  A first-person account from Young-sook sharing the details of her life from the 30s up until the 70s.  And a third person account from 2008 when Young-sook is an elderly woman and encounters the American descendants of Mi-ja and tries her best to avoid them.

This book is focused on the woman centred culture on the island of Jeju, where the women feed their families by what we would call 'free diving'.  The men stay at home and look after the babies, cook and clean.  The divers are called haenyeo and are the centre of this culture.

The story starts with the first dive of the two women and then goes back to recount the beginning of the friendship.  We see them becoming as close as sisters through tragedies and the trials of "going away water work" where they dive the frigid Russian coast to bring back money to their families.  Their friendship starts during the time of the Japanese occupation.  Mi-ja is tainted as the daughter of a collaborator and since her parent's death lives with her aunt and uncle who resent and underfeed her.  They grow up together, get married at the same time and marriage takes them to different villages and very different lives.

When the Japanese are replaced by the American's and supposed independence the lives of the people of Jeju get worse, culminating in an event that will change everything.

I loved the characters of both the women, and even though we never hear Mi-Ja directly we see her through the eyes of  Young-sook.  They are both utterly three dimensional and well developed.

This is a women's book.  Men are not given a very good reputation here, with one exception, the men are perceived as best as lazy and useless and at worst as violent and evil, this is the only bad thing that I can say about this book mind.

As with all of Lisa See's work, this book has been meticulously researched and the lengthy section at the end of the book gives a plethora of further reading material and other sources that she used, including details of the first-hand accounts that she obtained and used.
I have learned a lot whilst reading this book, effortlessly.  This is a compelling tale of friendship, loss and the importance of forgiveness and it's a really good read.

I was conflicted as to how I would rate this book as I set it down after reading. This is probably one of the few historical fiction books that I liked the historical part more than the fiction part. I will try to explain with more clarity once I go further into this review.

This is a story of a dying breed of women who undergo extreme physical hardship on a daily basis, these women dive for food and their livelihood. To them, this way of living is just a part of them. We are introduced to the Island of Jeju and the lives of the Haenyeo women in 2008. A lot of it has been reworked to suit the tourist trade but a few of the older ones remain with their stories. There is one such story that we are given access to, bit by bit with the picture becoming clearer. This was the fiction part of the tale and focuses on the atrocities that the families faced on a daily basis, I should have been more vested in the personal lives of the main family but I was more concerned about the growing and almost continuous unrest around them. It is rare for me to be more focused on the facts presented in a tale and although this is a good thing, I could not give it a full five stars because of this single reason, I would have rated it higher than the four stars I am giving it if any of the websites allowed such a thing.

The past story covers so many different 'governments' having a hand in how these people led their lives but not really assisting them in any fashion. It is hard to envision that humans caused such suffering but it harder to imagine the strength of those who manage a semblance of clarity or mental stability through it all. There are those who probably rise above all of this and lead a charge but this book is not about them. It is about the life on an isolated island rich in stories and song and hardworking women and how they dealt with what every decade threw at them. The story spans waters of different countries and the friendship of two girls who grew up learning to be the best Haenyeo  women they could. I highly recommend this to anyone who is looking to read about the history of a different part of the globe!

4.5 stars

Have you ever heard about the matriarchal society led by Haenyeo? No?! Well, me neither... until I read The Island of Sea Women. Haenyeo are female divers from the Korean island Jeju. Known for their independent spirit, strong will and bravery, the haenyeo are representative of the matriarchal society on Jeju. Society where having a daughter is a blessing because she and the mother can provide for the family while men stay at home and look after the children!

I absolutely loved and was fascinated by the world of the fearless and determined Korean women diving in an ice-cold sea to feed their families. The story in the latest Lisa See novel follows the lifetime of Young-sook starting in 1938 when she is a little girl learning the diving skills among a Haeyono collective led by her mother. Reading the book was like reading a memoir and I was kind of expecting the author to say in the acknowledgement that the story is based on a real person's life. That's not the case but the story is very powerful and thought provoking nonetheless. What's real is the historical events incorporated in the story such as the atrocious massacre at Bukchon or division of Korea after the WWII.

This is a stunning historical fiction novel that made me wonder what it would be like to live in a world with a matriarchal family structure, in a world ruled by women.

A must read for 2019!

<i>Many thanks to the publisher for my review coy in exchange for an honest review.

I found this book to be incredibly informative and taught me about a way of life I didn't know existed. Enjoyed this book.
Thank you for the advance copy

“You are a haenyeo! Never for one moment believe you are unworthy.”

The stunningly beautiful 제주도 (Jeju Island) is perhaps my favourite place to visit, which I do annually, perhaps more in future as my in-laws are building a hotel there. One of the many unique features are the 해녀 (haenyeo), the women divers, who combine the three elements (삼다도) of the island, 여자, 바람, 돌, women, wind and rocks (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haenyeo). Jeju is also acknowledges for lacking three things: beggars, thieves, and locked gates.

An excellent factual account of the haenyo is given Jeju Haenyeo: Stewards of the Sea by Anne Hilty, which Lisa See, the author of his novel, acknowledges as one of her many sources, available here: https://eastwestpsyche.files.wordpress.com/2015/06/book-i-jeju-haenyeo-stewards-of-the-sea-2015.pdf

Perhaps surprisingly, The Island of Sea Women is actually the second English language novel in recent months featuring the haenyeo, the first being White Chrysanthemum by Mary Lynn Bracht (my review https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2352288032). Although given the amazing stories behind the island Jeju and the haenyeo, who make their living harvesting the fruits of the sea - abalone, conch, octopus and sea cucumber etc - without using any breathing apparatus, perhaps the real surprise is that haenyo haven't featured in many novels before.

"When people suggested the haenyeo start using oxygen tanks, she, along with other divers around the island, refused. “Everything we do must be natural,” she’d told the collective, “otherwise we’ll harvest too much, deplete our wet fields, and earn nothing.” There, again, balance.."

Although now sometimes seen as more of a tourist attraction, being a haenyeo is a lifelong vocation and they remain rooted in the traditional culture of Jeju: indeed as author Lisa See points out, the term haenyeo itself was itself standardised in part to promote tourism (literally sea women): the traditional Jeju terms are jamnyeo (잠녀), or jamsu (잠수). From Hilty's account, while the term jamnyeo was first recorded in 1629 for Jeju women divers

"The term 'haenyeo' was first recorded in the 1791 Jonjaejip, a royal record identifying free-divers on small islands off of the Korean mainland, not Jeju. The terms for divers in use on the island were 'jamnyeo' (or 'jomnyeo' allowing for regional differences), both of which mean 'dive woman', or simply 'jamsu' for diving itself. 'Haenyeo' is closely related to the Japanese character for 'sea' and its use was enforced during the Colonial era, which has rendered it somewhat controversial. More recently, however, the Jeju government has begun using it consistently for enhancing the divers' status as a tourist attaction."

There is also a significant demographic crisis with the sustainability of the traditional profession: again per Hilty:

"There are presently 4,507 active divers registered, with another 5,380 in retirement; this figure represents a steady decline in the diver population since the late 1960s. As young women have stopped entering the profession for at least two generations (since the late 1960s), 98% are over the age of 50; more than 50% are over the age of 70, and less than 1% under the age of 30. As a further indication of the aging and decline of the diver population, in the 1960s a diver's peak was considered to be between the ages of 25-35, and she was an elder at 45 (also correlated to an average life expectancy of 52.4 years at that time); the final category of government statistical tables was 'over the age of 50'."

The Island of Sea Woman is a historical novel, that traces the life of one particular haenyo 김 영숙(Kim Young-sook) from her first formal dive aged 15, in 1938, to March 2008, when aged, 85, she is still diving. The narration alters between her first person historical recollections and a third-person narration, told in the present tense, of the 4 days in March 2008 leading up to the opening of the Jeju 4.3 peace park, commemorating the events of April 1948 (see below). Interlinked with her own story are that of her childhood friend and, initially, fellow haenyeo Mija (미자).

Both White Chrysanthemum and The Island of Sea Women start with the Japanese occupation of Korea generally, and Jeju specifically, in the first half of the 20th Century.

"We believed that these were the worst times we would experience— Japanese rule, resistance, and retaliation."

But in practice, worse was to come post the end of World War II and the liberation from Japan.

"Immediately after the war, we had great hopes for independence, but the Japanese colonists had merely been replaced by American occupiers through the United States Army Military Government in Korea."

The pivotal event in the Island of Sea Women (also covered in White Chrysanthemum) is the 제주 4·3 사건, the 3 April 1948 uprising on Jeju (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeju_uprising) by communist supporters in protest at the planned May 1948 elections planned only for the south of Korea:

"They want us to accept their form of democracy, with an American-backed dictator who can be controlled, while the people of Korea— especially here on Jeju—want to hold our own elections, with our own slate of candidates, so we can vote our own way. Isn’t that what democracy is supposed to be about?”
...
We will oppose country-dividing elections to the death. We will liberate families who have been separated by a line. We will drive the American cannibals and their running dogs from our country. Conscientious public officials and police, we call on you to rise up and help us fight for independence."

and the subsequent brutal anti-insurgency crackdown by the mainland authorities, supported (or at least tolerated) by US forces, which wreaked far more devastation on the islanders than the Japanese occupiers had managed in the previous decades. Looking back on the events 60 years later, the speaker who opens the memorial, arguing for mutual forgiveness, muses:

“Was this tragedy a riot that got out of hand? Was it a rebellion, a revolt, or an anti-American struggle? Or do we say it was a democratic movement, a struggle for freedom, or a mass heroic uprising that showed the independent spirit that has flowed in the blood of the people of this island since the Tamna Kingdom?”
[...]
“Should we blame the Americans? Their colonels, captains, and generals were here. Their soldiers saw what was happening. Even if they didn’t directly kill anyone, thousands of deaths occurred under their watch, but they do not take responsibility. And not once did they intervene to stop the bloodshed. Or do we accept that they were trying to suppress the very real threat of communism at the early stages of what would become the Cold War? Was the Four-Three Incident America’s first Vietnam? Or was it a fight for people who craved reunification of north and south and wanted to have a say in what happened in our country, without interference or influence from a foreign power?”

This uprising was also covered in the brave novel by 현기영 (Hyeon Gi-yeong), Aunt Suni (순이삼촌), which I unfortunately read in what the authorative Ktlit website described as "in contention for the worst translation from Korean to English in the last decade" (http://www.ktlit.com/hatred-rage-and-aunt-suni/), although it has been susequently retranslated. The comprehensiveness of Lisa See's research - as well as the rather expository approach to relaying it - is demonstrated by her having her narrator Young-sook think aloud about this book, little known in English:

"Thirty years ago, back in 1978, a writer named Hyun Ki-young published a story called Aunt Suni. Young-sook couldn’t read it. She never did learn to read, but she heard it was about what happened in Bukchon. The author was taken to the national spy agency, where he was tortured. He wasn’t released until he promised never to write about the 4.3 Incident again."

White Crysanthemeum was primarily focused on the kidnapping of young Korean girls to become comfort women in Manchuria. "The decision to make Hana a haenyeo was partly a plot device. Bracht needed a heroine who was physically and mentally strong enough to break out of a prison camp." (https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/long-reads/article/2137166/novelists-deep-dive-korean-wartime-sex-slaves) and actually she didn't visit Jeju, I believe, until she had finished the book.

The Island of Sea Women is a book rooted in much more detailed research of Jeju and the haenyeo though, as noted, there is a lot of verbal exposition in the novel, and, as often with the historic fiction genre, a plot that has to cover each significant event and writing that has to dutifly work in each interesting snipped of research.

Although the verbal exposition is perhaps most justified when Young-sook's elders are teaching her and Mija about haenyeo ways, as this paints an effective picture of a culture using aural history and repetition of familiar tales (much as Judaism does even today).

As the novel opens, as she reaches 15, and becomes eligible to be a young diver, her mother, leader of the local collective, tells her:

"Today, Halmang Samseung’s job is done. As the goddess who oversees pregnancy, childbirth, and raising a child to the age of fifteen, she is now fully released from her duties."

She goes on to explain key elements of safety:

“You’re not only painting a map of the seabed in your head,” Mother instructed me on a bright fall morning as we walked to the bulteok, “you’re learning where you are in space. You need always to be aware of where you are in relation to the boat, the shore, your tewak, Mi-ja , me, and the other haenyeo. You’re learning about tides, currents, and surges, and about the influence of the moon on the sea and on your body. It’s most important that you always be mindful of where you are in that moment when your lungs begin to crave breath.”

And yet being a haenyeo is ultimately a commercial enterprise - the women dive to provide for their families:

“The sea, it is said , is like a mother. The salt water, the pulse and surges of the current, the magnified beat of your heart, and the muffled sounds reverberating through the water together recall the womb. But we haenyeo must always think about making money . . . and surviving. Do you understand?”

The novel also brings out Jeju’s unusual matrifocal culture: "It’s not a matriarchy. Rather, it’s a society focused on women." As the haenyeo agree when later explaining their culture to Young-sook's Seoul National University studying daughter, for her sociology course:

“It’s better to be born a cow than a woman. No matter how stupid or lazy a man is, he has the better hand. He doesn’t have to supervise the family. He doesn’t have to wash clothes, manage the household, look after the elders, or see that the children have food to eat and mats to sleep on. He doesn’t have to do hard physical work in the wet or dry fields. His only responsibilities are to take care of babies and do a little cooking.”

“In other places, he would be called a wife,” Joon-lee said.

My daughter looked up from her notebook. “It seems to me that what you’re saying is you’re in charge, and yet you aren’t. When husbands die, houses and fields pass to sons. Why is it that men own all the property?”“You know the reason,”I answered. “A daughter cannot perform the ancestral rites, so all property must go to sons. It is how we thank them for caring for us in the Afterworld.”

The novel also traces the modernisation of both Jeju and indeed the haenyeo over the 70 years in which it is set. Young-sook clings to her traditional ways, only reluctantly giving up her traditional toilet, part of a system where the human excrement feeds the pigs, the pigs excrement fertilises the fields, which in turn grow crops to feed both the people and the livestock, with pork as a delicacy saves for auspicious occasions.

"I climbed the ladder to the stone structure and positioned myself over the hole in the floor. Below, our pigs gathered, snuffling eagerly."

But Jeju itself turns into a tourist playground of bizarrely numerous museums (https://www.tripzilla.com/interesting-museums-jeju-island/47594) and hotels and restaurants:

"The Kang sisters on the other hand . . . They’re always telling her about this or that museum, park, or attraction they’ve visited. “Right on our island!” they’ll burst out in unison. The Museum of Greek Mythology, the Leonardo da Vinci Science Museum, the African Museum.
....
Her house perches on the rocky shoreline overlooking the sea. It doesn’t look like much— just two small structures made from native stone, but the location . . . Her children and grandchildren have suggested she allow them to convert the buildings into a restaurant and bar. “Oh, Granny, you’ll be rich. You’ll never have to work again.” One of her neighbors did as the younger generation asked . Now that woman’s home is a guesthouse and an Italian restaurant. On Young-sook’s beach. In her village. She will never let that happen to her house."

Mija and Young-sook's relationship is a troubled one. Mija's mother died at childbirth and she is tainted by her father's role as a collaborators with the Japanese colonial authorities. Their friendship undergoes a tragic, and near permanent, breach after the tragic events of April 1948, but their lives remain intertwined, even if the two themselves don't speak, through their children. Young-sook willingly loses touch completely with Mi-ja when the latter moves, with her children, to the US, although to do so causes a breach in Young-sook's own family:

"She remembered all the rumors she’d heard about Mi-ja over the years: she was in America, living in a mansion , driving her own car, and sending money to her part of the village. But there were other stories too: she had a small grocery store in Los Angeles, she lived in an apartment, she was lonely because she was too old to pick up the language."

And the opening of the peace park in 2008 brings visitors from the US, with a story to tell:

"In Young-sook’s peripheral vision she glimpses another family group. They aren’t dressed alike, and they don’t look alike. The husband is white, the wife is Korean, and the children— a small boy and a teenage girl—are mixed. Young-sook can’t help it, but seeing those half-and-half children makes her uncomfortable."

This is very much historical fiction, not my normal genre, and with a little too much exposition, but a powerful and important story, carefully researched and respectfully rendered. 4 stars

Thanks to Simon and Schuster and NetGalley for providing me with an Advance Review Copy in exchange for an honest review.

I’ve read a number of Lisa See’s books in the past so was excited to see that she has written a new novel. This story follows Young-Sook and Mi-Ja, two Haenyeo, Korean women who harvest the sea floor by free diving. I was familiar with real life Haenyeo stories beforehand and it was great to see a novel written about these fascinating women. The book is written from Young-Sook's perspective and follows her life as a young girl in the 1940s through to 2008. The book flashes back and forward through time to allow the mysteries of the past to unfold.

The society on Jeju island, where the story takes place, is unusual in that women go out to do the difficult, often dangerous work and the men stay home to cook, clean and look after the children. Throughout the book we can see many instances of what we may see as typical ‘women’s work’ being undertaken by men and vice versa. One quote that particularly tickled me was “A woman is not meant for the household!” These are the realities of life on Jeju and it makes for fascinating and thought-provoking reading. All too often we are led to think that it is in a woman’s innate make-up to be best suited to looking after children whereas men are best suited to provide and work, and yet, here is a society where the opposite is true.

The heart of the novel is Young-Sook and Mi-Ja's friendship and the trials and tribulations they experience throughout their lives. From the start they are drawn together despite their differences, Young-Sook is the daughter of the leader of the diving collective, Mi-Ja is the daughter of a Japanese collaborator. Young-Sook's mother extends the hand of kindness to Mi-Ja and becomes a mother figure to her. From then on Young-Sook and Mi-Ja are inseparable. The shadow of the Japanese occupation looms large and Mi-Ja, as the daughter of a collaborator, is an outcast until her friendship with Young-Sook brings her into the fold.

The book covers the time period of World War 2 through to the Korean War and its aftermath. The horrors and inhumanity of war are explored in unflinching detail. The characters suffer through grief and loss and come to understand the difficulty of, but the need for, forgiveness.

Motherhood is another key theme running through the story, the love between generations and the relationships between women are felt through the vivid cast of characters. The dynamic of a working mother and the sacrifices the Haenyeo women make to provide for their family is surprisingly similar to the experiences of working women today. “Every woman must leave her children to work, and every mother suffers, but we do it”. As a working mother herself who feels often feels guilty, this really resonated with me.

The lure of the sea and its wonders are tangible throughout the novel. I love books about the sea, so I'm probably biased, but I really felt like I was under the waves with Young-Sook as she explored the underwater world and its treasures and dangers -the sea giveth and the sea taketh away. The customs and traditions of the Haenyeo women were also explored and tied into the lives of the characters.

I really didn’t want this book to end and I devoured it in a day. See has created a memorable cast of characters that will stay with me for a long time. Considering the time period and events this book covers, it is not always an easy read, but it still remains a beautiful account of female friendship, love, loss and the enduring relationships between women.

Wow what a book, fab story plus it taught me many things. I’m so ignorant, I knew nothing about Korea, the atrocities they went through, I never knew these diver women existed. Such a well written book, couldn’t put it down.

If you like historical fiction that focuses on the main characters' lives shaped by real historical events, you will like "The Island of Sea Women' a lot. The two protagonists, Young-Soon and Mi-ja, are best friends from the heanyeo diving collective - they free dive to harvest the abundant flora and fauna of the sea floor to eat it and sell it. They come from different backgrounds but their friendship is strong, surviving hardships, arranged marriages and the turmoils of war, until one event pushes them apart and changes their relationship forever.

"The Island of Sea Women" definitely taught me something new - I have never heard of haenyeo of Jeju and my knowledge of Korean history is very sketchy. So I loved those parts of the novel, especially haenyeo traditions and parts about their unique matrifocal society in which women are providers and men stay home to take care of children. However, the storyline (although captivating and engaging) was following a trope rather similar to the one in "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan", of friendship damaged by differences of personal circumstances and misunderstandings. If - like me - you read and loved that book, "the Island..." might not be as fascinating to you. But if this is your first Lisa See novel, I hope you will enjoy it as much as I did.

First of all: I very much enjoyed the setting of this book, though one particularly gruesome incident, which happens around 3/4 of the way through, is deeply unsettling. I learned a great deal about a society which I knew very little about, though I was aware of 4.3 and the political cover-up that followed, having read about the similar event which took place in Nanjing.
I would not hesitate to recommend this title to fans of historical fiction or fans of books like My Brilliant Friend, which follow a family through multiple generations. However, I cannot help but compare this book to Lisa See's earlier novel, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. The plot is almost identical! Two girls are raised together after one of them loses her family. When they are still young, one of their friends dies a tragic death as a result of their 'disobedience'. Both girls are trained in difficult and/or dangerous arts. They learn to communicate in a unique way. When they grow older, they enter into arranged marriages, only one of which is a success. They fall out over a misunderstanding and come together only when it is too late.
If you have not read a book by Lisa See, read this one. If you have already read one, give this one a miss, unless you enjoy reading a familiar story.