Message from an Unknown Chinese Mother. Stories of Loss and Love by Xinran Xue

Again and again, I cannot and will not believe that outdated customs combined with government policy can really force human beings to renounce that most beautiful and basic of human feelings, the parental instinct. It should not be possible, but it is.

Message from an Unknown Chinese Mother is a heart-rending, eye-opening account of women's lives in China. It is a recounting of the "tragic stories of what traditionally happened to abandoned girl babies and what continues to happen." Each of these stories sears the heart as the reader comes face to face with the clash of Chinese culture, traditional and modern, and the deepest desires of the heart in Chinese women.

Xinran's book is a collection of stories told to her as well as personal incidents she experienced when she worked as a reporter and radio broadcaster in China. These are painful stories, told by courageous mothers, to Xinran over a period of years either in person or in the form of letters. It took many years before Xinran could bring herself to tell these stories.

In her travels within China, Xinran discovered the crushing poverty of her fellow Chinese and how little she knew of Chinese history and culture. She came to understand that young Chinese did not know what their mothers and grandmothers had suffered. She also realized from her life in the United Kingdom that many Westerners had no understanding of the Chinese people. When she was asked if it was "true that Chinese women physically lack emotional cells and are mentally short of love" Xinran was devastated and angry.

This book, which she began to write in 2008 was to show that Chinese women have suffered terribly and continue to suffer so. It was to demonstrate the ability of Chinese mothers, daughters and grandparents to love deeply and unconditionally, but that their culture works against their feminine nature in ways that Westerners cannot comprehend.

During the course of writing books about Chinese society and Chinese mothers, Xinran received many letters from Chinese women who placed their daughters for adoption with Western families. By the end of 2010, Xinran writes that the number of Chinese orphans adopted numbers over one hundred twenty thousand!! - almost all of whom are girls. Why is this so? Why are the Chinese abandoning their girls?

Xinran believes that girl babies are abandoned in China for 3 main reasons:

1. traditional practices in Eastern farming cultures in which a preference for boys who can undertake hard manual labour. There is also the ancient system of land allotment in China in which males are given land and therefore are responsible for creating wealth, Females do not have such rights.
2. sexual ignorance and economics
3. one child policy which then made it imperative that in order for number 1 to hold, couples MUST have a male child if they wanted to increase their wealth and carry on the family name.

Discussion

Message from an Unknown Chinese Mother is not for the faint of heart. The stories leave one gasping at the seemingly callous perspective that pervades Chinese society, particularly in rural China, one that holds that girl babies are better off dead than living in any sort of existence. Xinran struggles to understand this mindset and what drives families to abandon their baby girls. Sometimes these encounters occurred during what appears to be an ordinary day - such as bicycling to work.

When Xinran rescued a baby girl abandoned in front of a public toilet she was admonished and harassed."The words rang in my ears but I kept repeating to myself: No, no, I'm not going to let this tiny creature die in front of my eyes. This is a human being. A real live human being capable of giving life to countless other lives."

When she rushed the baby to the hospital Emergency Department she was told that without a birth permit, they could not treat the baby. It was only when Xinran threatened to talk about this on her radio show that the nurse relented and the baby was saved. The duty nurse told Xinran that the hospital received so many abandoned baby girls that they had to hire night guards to prevent people from abandoning babies at their doors.

There is no doubt that Chinese women bear a heavy burden of suffering. It is very likely that the traditional cultural preferences for male children combined with the draconian one child policy have led to the abandonment and outright murder of millions of Chinese girls. As a result, it is estimated that tens of millions of Chinese girls are "missing". Human rights groups, population experts and social scientists have been warning for many years now of the effects of this gender imbalance will have on Chinese society.

Attitudes towards women and girls need to change in Asia especially in China and India. Public policy also needs to change. Governments have no business telling couples how many children they can have. Young women who become pregnant need the support of family and society to bear their children and if they so choose, to keep and raise them. Culture has no business telling women that girls are worthless. Without women, a society loses its heart and will inevitably die.

Xinran Xue's book is an important window into Chinese culture. It is highly recommended as is her website The Mothers' Bridge of Love: https://www.mothersbridge.org/

Book Details:
Message from an Unknown Chinese Mother. Stories of Loss and Love by Xinran
New York: Scribner 2010
239 pp.

deadly by Julie Chibbaro

We've all heard of "Typhoid Mary". Who was she? What was her story?
Deadly is a smart retelling of the story of Mary Mallon, an Irish immigrant who worked as a cook in New York City in 1907. Her story is told through the diary of 16 year old Prudence Galewski, a young Jewish girl living in New York City at the turn of the 1900's.

Prudence and her mother, whom she calls Marm, are alone and struggling to make ends meet. Prudence hase suffered the loss of both her father and her brother. Her father, Gregory Galewski is missing in action, having gone to Cuba to fight in the Spanish-American war of 1898, while her brother Benjamin died from gangrene. Prudence is interested in science and more specifically in why people get sick and die. She has a secret desire to understand the human body. This desire originated from her experiences helping her mother who is a midwife. Of course, in 1906, these sort of inquiries are not expected from young women.

Instead she is stuck learning how to walk on her toes, draw portraits and embroider at Mrs. Browning's School for Girls where she has been enrolled by her mother in the hopes of improving her social status. After applying for numerous typist jobs, Prudence is offered a unique job in the New York Department of Health and Sanitation. There she is an assistant to Mr. George Soper, a Sanitary Engineer who as head epidemiologist for the department, investigates the causes of disease epidemics. It is the perfect job for Prudence who tries to learn everything she can about the body, disease and how people get sick.

Initially, Soper is sent out to investigate an outbreak of typhoid at Oyster Bay on Long Island. When tests at the house fail to find the source of the outbreak Prudence makes an astonishing discovery that leads them to consider the cook as a possible source. That cook is Mary Mallon. When they approach Mary she is uncooperative, violent and refuses to be tested. And so begins the struggle to quarantine and test Mallon - one of the first recognized "carriers" of disease. When she is finally captured and Soper's theory is proved correct, they must deal with the ramifications of their actions. They have taken an apparently healthy adult woman, arrested her and placed her in quarantine with other patients who are sick.

Matters are further complicated when Prudence finds herself forming an attachment to Mr. Soper. Added to this, Prudence herself has also reached an important personal turning point in her life. Her acquaintance with Dr. Baker makes Mary aware for the first time of the possibility of studying medicine.

Prudence is more an observer to the actions of Soper and Dr. Baker than a participant. Chibbaro develops Prudence in the role of a character of conscience in deadly. She is someone who questions the actions and motives of the New York Department of Sanitation, the police and the medical profession in the case of Mary Mallon.

"How did he and Dr. Baker find the strength necessary to take the cook from her life they way they did? ... And was it right? I felt as if we had broken the law. We had no warrant for her arrest, no right to raid her employer's home. Her typhoid was still speculative. Weren't we obliged to release her?"

Prudence sees Mary as a person with dignity, instead of a unique medical case to be investigated.

"Besides the obvious question - does she really carry the typhoid germ? - there are still so many unknowns to her case. What is her history? Who is she, and where has she been?..."

"It's one thing to follow the course of a disease through observation and questioning. It is truly another to be out jailing human beings suspected of carrying germs....The whole incident was immoral."

This is in direct contrast to Mr. Soper who seems clinical and whose concern is focused more on the families who have hired Mary and the people who are sick. It seems his lack of concern for Mary begins when she starts to resist any attempts to test her as a carrier. She is robust and healthy and doesn't believe she could make anyone sick.

Eventually Prudence feels deeply conflicted over the Mary Mallon situation. The conflict she senses is that between a scientist's quest to learn and the dignity of the human person. There is also the balancing of the rights of the individual person with those of society. Prudence worries she will not be able to consider medical cases from a purely scientific point of view if she were to study medicine. In a meeting with Dr. Baker, she confides her concerns;

"I saw illness as a kind of week, something that could be found and cleaned away. I didn't think it could live inside a person without sickening or killing them, not like with Mary. Now it's as if the disease and the person are inseparable. When the police officer threw Mary in the snow and they locked her up, they were treating her like a disease...."

It is therefore, through the thoughts of Prudence, that Chibbaro wants us to consider Mary Mallon's position and what it must have been like for her. She tells us in her Author's Note that she wanted a sympathetic protagonist for her retelling of the story of "Typhoid Mary". She wanted someone who understood the immigrants position in early 20th century American society and how they might have perceived the Mary Mallon situation.

Typhoid was a bacterial disease that killed people by the hundreds and even thousands. Medical professionals and sanitation experts had been working for years to clean up the municipal water supplies and improve sewers and sanitation. They often faced great resistance from a public who couldn't understand the science behind the policies.

Mary Mallon was one of the first living examples in support of a new theory put forth by Dr. Koch of Germany; that a healthy person could be a carrier of disease without actually becoming ill from it.
This idea was so revolutionary, that many people had great trouble accepting it just as they had great trouble believing many years earlier that tiny microscopic organisms were responsible for disease. For Mr. Soper and Dr. Baker, it must have been supremely frustrating to deal with someone like Mary Mallon and her supporters. The scientific evidence pointed to her being the cause of the typhoid outbreaks, yet she saw herself as a victim of Irish prejudice and fear.

It's easy to judge the past from the comfort of the present given our modern, highly efficient investigative tools. Soper and Baker did not have much in the way to offer Mary Mallon as treatment and therefore this made the situation more critical and requiring more direct means of action. Chibbaro puts the Mary Mallon situation in to perspective considering the social situation and conditions that existed in the time in America

Chibbaro's novel is well written and engaging with the story having a touch of romance. Young readers will learn about a controversial event that had a major ramifications on public health policy. Along the way they will be rooting for a female protagonist living in society on the cusp of new scientific discoveries- discoveries that would forever change the day to day life of most people.

Book Details:

deadly by Julie Chibbaro
New York: Antheneum Books for Young Readers Simon & Schuster 2010
293pp

Daughter of Xanadu by Dori Jones Yang

Fifteen-year-old Emmajin, granddaughter of Emperor Khubilai Khan, watches on the balcony of the palace gate as the Mongol army rides into Khanbalik for the grand victory parade. Beside her is her cousin and best friend, Suren oldest grandson of Khan.

The army, led by General Bayan has just conquered a large city in the south, opening the way to Kinsay, the capital of southern China. Emmajin's father, Prince Dorji stands by the side of the seated emperor. Prince Dorji, the oldest of Khan's sons had run away to a Buddhist temple while Suren's father, Khan's second son Chimkin had gained great honour by leading armies and winning battles.

Emmajin races down to the main avenue, followed by Suren. At street level the parade includes a huge elephant with General Bayan seated atop in an open carriage. Emmajin is pulled onto a horse by her Uncle Todogen and becomes part of the parade that makes its way to the square in front of the Khan's palace. Emmajin wants to be a soldier in the Khan's army. 

That night as Emmajin and Suren wait for Old Master, the court storyteller, to tell stories, she wonders if there are any Mongol women soldiers. Emmajin knows about Mulan, the Chinese woman who fought against her Mongol ancestors. She remembers her great-great-grandfather Chinggis Khan, founder of the Mongol Empire, and how his mother and his first wife showed courage and determination. She also recalls how the mother of Khubilai Khan trained her sons to rule the Empire. Old Master tells how the Mongol army laid seige to Hsiangyang and used Persian catapults to destroy the city. Old Master empties a sack of ears from the enemy onto the floor. Suren recoils and Emmajin feels horror, while Temur, Suren's younger brother is thrilled. Emmajin decides to enjoy the moment and in her excitement reveals to Suren that she wants to join the army. He will be joining in Ninth Moon. Temur, tall and handsome, announces and archery contest for all boys of the court, the following day on what is Emmajin's sixteenth birthday. 

When Emmajin returns home, she learns that her father, Prince Doji has arranged for her to meet the eldest son of General Aju at noon. She is to sit quietly and to serve them to prove she can be a proper wife.  Unlike her sister Drolma, Emmajin isn't interested in marrying or in embroidery, dancing, and music. She knows that once she is betrothed, her chances of joining the army will vanish forever.

General Aju, a high ranking military commander and his son Jebe arrive early. as Emmajin is serving them, she cannot resist asking Aju about the catapults used in the seige. This puts off Aju and the betrothal talks end,leaving her father chagrined. She has sabotaged four betrothal attempts now.  At this, Emmaji boldly asks her father to allow her to join the army. He tells her the Khan would never agree and that it is wrong to kill humans. Prince Doji refuses Emmajin's request, giving her an amulet of Tara, the Great Protectress but Emmajin doesn't follow his practice of Buddhism. Undaunted, she participates in the archery tournament that day.

When she arrives in the courtyard for the archery contest, Emmajin is confronted by Temur, but Suren as the eldest grandson insists that she be allowed to compete. As she awaits her turn, Emmajin notices a heavily bearded foreigner watching the competition.  When it is time for Temur, Suren and Emmajin to compete, she asks the Khan that she be allowed to compete and if pleased, he allow her to join the army. The Khan makes no promises but she is allowed in the contest which will be mounted archery.

On her horse Baatar, a golden palomino stallion, Emmajin watches as Temur hits the target three times and Suren misses twice. However, now Emmajin struggles with what to do: should she beat Suren who is the eldest grandson and heir to the throne? Emmajin's first two shots hit the target but when an image of the strange foreigner enters her mind, she loses her concentration and misses her third shot. Baatar stumbles throwing Emmajin into his mane. Bleeding profusedly and deeply humiliated, Emmajin is furious at the bearded foreigner. She insults him by spitting blood at his feet.

The next day, the fifth day of the Fifth Moon and also Emmajin's sixteenth birthday, "the Khan, his court and most of the Golden family" are leaving for the summer palace in Xanadu. While Emmajin doesn't want to get up, her mother tells her she must as she has the honour of riding with the Great Khan. Xanadu or Shangdu  is located on a high plateau separated from Cathay (northern China) by a group of hills. The Khan spends time relaxing in a smaller palace there. The trip to Xanadu will take three days. 

In the courtyard, Emmajin sees four giant elephants who are tethered together with an ornate pavilion set across their backs. In the pavilion she finds the Great Khan and his chief wife Empress Chabi who is her grandmother, seated on benches. The Great Khan tells Emmajin that he has a special assignmment for her. Riding with them will be three Latins who are merchants from the Far West. The Khan plans to conquer their lands after he subdues China. To achieve this goal he wants Emmajin to gather "intelligence" for him: to kow their religion, kings, language, their lands and what riches they have.  Emmajin agrees. The foreigner who she must spy on is Marco Polo, the man who distracted her during the archery competition. He is a young man of twenty-one, with a dark heavy beard and green eyes.  Emmajin is confused by his behaviour and has no idea out to deal with this "unpredictable, outlandish man". However, her time with Emmajin begins to change her perspective on other cultures and more importantly war. Her friendship with Marco will have life changing implications for young Emmajin.

Discussion

In Daughter of Xanadu, Dori Jones Yang has crafted a fascinating historical novel centered around the visit of Marco Polo to the Great Khubilai Khan who was a grandson of Genghis Khan. Also known as Kublai Khan, he was the 5th Khan to rule the Mongolia Empire from 1260 to 1294. Among his major conquests was the subjugation of China and the forming of the Yuan Dynasty in 1271. The Great Khan met Marco Polo's father, Niccolo and his Uncle Maffeo when they travelled to Asia years before. Daughter of Xanadu takes place when Niccolo and Maffeo return to China, this time with a young Marco.

In this regard, Daughter of Xanadu is a romanticized fictional account of some of Marco Polo's adventures in Xanadu. According to the opening of the story, it tells "the story of two adventurous hearts from thousands of miles and worlds apart: one from medieval Venice and the others from the royal court of the Mongol Empire."

Although she doesn't mention this in her forward, the fictional character of Emmajin in many ways resembles a real historical female Mongol warrior known as Khutulun who was born in 1260. One of the great-great-granddaughters of  Genghis Khan, Khutulun's father was Kaidu, a cousin of Kubilai Khan who came to rule over parts of eastern Asia and who challenged Kubilai Khan. Khutulun was a warrior princess who excelled in horseback riding, archery and wrestling and who was known as a formidable warrior. She often accompanied her father into battle and she also met Marco Polo who described her in his book about his travels. Khutulun is mentioned in Daughter of Xanadu by Marco Polo who tells a story to the Great Khan of "...a woman named Ai-Jaruk, daughter of King Kaidu...". Ai-Jaruk is one of the names Khutulun was known by. 

Daughter of Xanadu focuses on Emmanjin's relationship with Marco Polo and his influence on how she views her Mongol culture and how she views war. When she first encounters this bearded stranger with his green eyes and red hair and beard, she finds his exotic appearance and manners attractive. His accounts of knights and "courtly love" are very alien to Emmajin: the idea of a man serving a woman seem preposterous to her. "Could love for a woman actually enoble and inspire a man, rather than weaken him, and distract him from his duty?...Women were meant to serve men not the other way around." This foreign idea confuses Emmajin. "My ambition had always been to be a warrior, but thie foreign notion, courtly love, appealed to something so deep in me I had not known it was there."

As her friendship with Marco grows, Emmajin begins to feel conflicted over her assignment by the Great Khan to learn about potential weakness of the countries in the west, so that they might be conquered.  The possibility of someday riding to war to conquer his homeland disturbs her. Yet she believes she must remain loyal to her people and to the Khan.  It is only when talking to Marco's Uncle Matteo that Emmajin realizes how the Mongols might overtake Christendom: if they help to free the Holy Land, Mongols from Russia and Asia might attack Christendom while its warriors are in the Holy Land. In this way " ...the whole west would fall at once, into our Empire." 

Emmajin reveals what she has learned to Chimkin. Unexpectedly Marco learns what Emmajin has done and confronts her. "From the beginning, then, your purpose was to gather information about my homeland, so the Great Khan could decide how best to invade and conquer it."  Emmajin's words to Marco reveal her inner conflict. She explains that it was her assignment and if she did well she might be allowed to join the Khan's army. But as she tells him this, Emmajin wonders, "...What have I done? This man had never harmed me, never tried to control me. He had trusted me. Now I had sown the seeds of destruction of his homeland." 

Emmajin realizes that in spending time with Marco Polo she has learned to see the world through his eyes, offering her a different perspective. After the Great Khan watches Emmajin and Suren training, she tells him that she has no desire to be a part of an invasion of Christendom. The Great Khan reminds Emmajin that "...every man you kill in battle has a father, an uncle, a homeland, some skill...". At this time Emmajin sees her ability to identify with Marco as a weakness. Later on as a soldier, when she listens to Marco Polo speaking with General Abaji, she decides that her time with Marco "...had gradually reshaped my view of the world, polluting my Mongolian idealism...I was robbed of my central faith, faith in the absolute glory and wisdom of Chinggis Khan. " But Emmajin's experiences as a soldier will change that.

Emmajin's view of war and conquest changes with time. When Marco attempts to explain to her how the people of Christendom love peace and freedom. But Emmajin responds, "The only way you can make peace is through conquest.And the only way to keep it is to suppress rebels and bandits by force." Marco attempts to explain that sometimes peace can be achieved through talk. However, Emmajin believes that his country is better under the rule of the Mongols. Marco tells her how the Mongols known as Tartars are dreaded in the west. "If my people could see the splendors of Xanadu they might change their minds. But we hear horrible stories of the hordes that invaded Christendom. Those warriors raped, looted, massacred innocents by the thousands. They cut off the ears of each person they killed." However, to Emmajin, "Eternal heaven ordained that the Mongols conquer all lands, from the rising of the sun to the setting of the sun. This is out destiny."

As a soldier, Emmajin's first doubts come in Szechwan, when in a small village that has been burned to the ground by Mongol troops led by Kubilai Khan twenty years earlier, she sees an enormous pile of bleached bones. Realizing that some of the bones were those of children, Emmajin is horrified. "It seemed impossible that brave Mongol soldiers would kill so many. That the great Kubilai Khan, with his good humor and intellectual interests, could have ordered it..."  Emmajin has dreamed of gaining glory by killing many enemy soldiers, "...But a village of ordinary people, including women and children? In resisting the Mongols, they had merely been defending their homes. No wonder Marco wanted to prevent this from happening in Christendom." 

It is after the battle of Vochan in which Emmajin's beloved cousin, Suren dies that she begins to face the reality of war. While others including Marco Polo and General Abaji praise Emmajin for her fighting, she finds no satisfaction. "Suren was dead. Marco and I were alive. I had proved I could fight like a man. But there was no thrill in it." Her idealizing of war and facing its reality has changed Emmahjin. "Losing Suren and nearly losing Marco had made me rethink what was important to me. Before I had met Marco, all that had mattered was my ambition to join the Khan's army and achieve glory in battle. Now I had achieved those goals, but they were empty vessels. Glory on the battlefield had come with a price to high to bear."

As they begin the journey away from Vochan, Emmajin listens as the tales of the battle grow and she realizes that the stories the Old Master tells are false, enriching the glory of battle to encourage men to fight. Emmajin's perceptions of war, manhood, valor, and life and death are forever changed.This realization plus her affection for Marco lead to a crisis for Emmajin. After speaking with her father, Prince Dorji at the buddhist temple, Emmajin realizes that she wants to work to prevent war, specifically her Mongol people from attacking Christendom. With Marco Polo, she wants to work for peace. To that end, Emmajin who is now in love with Marco Polo is able to convince Kubilai Khan to allow her to travel with Marco Polo back to Venezia to attempt to bring peace between the Mongol Empire and Christendom.

While Daughter of Xanadu is a novel that focuses on a fictional Mongol princess, Emmajin, her desire to become a warrior and her relationship with Venetian explorer and trader Marco Polo, it does incorporate a great deal of history into the story. Marco Polo was born while his father Niccolo and his Uncle Maffeo were away and after the death of his mother, was raised by an aunt and uncle. Niccolo and Maffeo travelled from Constantinople through Asia where they met Kubilai Khan who had founded the Yuan dynasty. Niccolo and Maffeo returned to Venice in 1269 but set out on a second voyage, this time with seventeen-year-old Marco with them. When a new pope was elected the Polos carried a letter from the pope to the Great Khan inviting him to send emissaries to Rome. They then travelled to Xanadu (also called Shangdu). The Khan sent Marco Polo on various missions throughout his empire, including India and Burma (now Myanmar). Marco would spend seventeen years travelling throughout China. The Great Khan would not allow the Polos to return to Christendom until sometime around 1291. They did arrive in Venezia until 1295. 

Although the novel's main theme initially focuses on Emmajin's struggle to become a warrior in the Mongol army, the story gradually becomes a romance that at times doesn't feel believable. And yet it is possible as there is a legend in the Veneto region of Italy, that Marco Polo fell in love with one of the daughters of the Great Khan, married her and returned with her to Venice, in 1295. His Chinese wife was not well accepted in Venetian society as she was different in appearance and culture and was not a Christian. The legend also states that when Marco was captured by the Genoese and imprisoned in 1298, his jealous sisters told his Chinese wife that he had been executed. In despair, she threw herself into the canal outside their home. The Malibran Theatre was built on the location of the old Polo house and excavations following a devastating fire uncovered the skeletal remains of an Asian woman along with a tiara and a robe.

  
Daughter of Xanadu is well written, with lots of detail about life in Xanadu and the customs of the Mongolian people in the late thirteenth century and even the Battle of Vochan between China and Burma. Young readers will find the romanticized story Marco Polo's time with the Great Khan appealing. Emmajin is a well developed character who, with her feministic character will appeal to young women readers.

Book Details:

Daughter of Xanadu by Dori Jone Yang
New York: Delacorte Press 2011
336 pp.

Threads and Flames by Esther Friesner

Threads and Flames is a fictional account of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire which occurred on March 25, 2011. This disaster forever changed the way factories treated their workers and helped to create support for workers unions and workers rights. At 4:45pm at the end of a Saturday workday, workers were in the process of leaving the building and collecting their belongings when fire broke out in the scraps of material beneath a table of sewing machines.

The Triangle Shirtwaist Company had the practice of locking all the doors and searching employees at closing time to make sure they did not steal from the company. All the doors in the building opened inwards which would have disastrous consequences for those trying to flee. The company also insisted that its building was fireproof and that the fire escape at the back of the building was sufficient to evacuate the building should a fire happen. Only 27 buckets of water were available to use in dousing any initial fire.

When the fire broke out on the eighth floor, it spread quickly due to the large amounts of cloth, bins of rags, hanging patterns and sewing machine oil. Trapped by the locked doors, barred windows and a fire-engulfed stairwell, many young women chose to leap from the eighth and ninth floor windows. The other choice was to burn to death. Witnesses at the scene describe the sickening sound of body after body hitting the pavement. In all 146 people either burned to death or leapt to their death.

More than anything, it was the sight of young women leaping to their deaths that motivated people to seek changes in the fire prevention laws and also in workplace safety laws. Although the owners of the factory were prosecuted, they were acquitted because they broke no existing fire laws.

Discussion

Friesner's novel starts off slow, carefully building both setting, background and characters. We first meet thirteen year old Raisa as she is recovering from typhus. There is a foreshadowing of the future catastrophe in Raisa's life in the description of Raisa's illness. "Raisa's world was fire. The blaze was everywhere. She was lost in the heart of the flames. Wherever she turned, walls of heat beat against her like hammers. The air throbbed and rang, filling her head with merciless thunder."

When she recovers from her illness, Raisa learns that her older sister Henda, who emigrated to American four years earlier to escape the unwanted attentions of an obsessed suitor, has saved enough money for her to come to America. We follow Raisa as she leaves the Polish shetl and her beloved Glukel, a neighbour who took care of both her and Henda after the death of their mother. On the voyage to America, Raisa befriends another young Jewish girl, Zusa Reshevsky who is joining her family in New York. She also takes on the responsibility of caring for an orphaned child, Brina whose mother dies on the voyage. Upon arriving in New York city, Raisa soon learns that Henda has vanished from the tenement house where she was last living. From the information Raisa can gather, it seems that Henda was very distraught, believing that her sister Raisa had died from typhus. Raisa's search for Henda thus becomes a subplot within the storyline.

Despite initial struggles to find a place to stay and work, Raisa and Brina eventually settle in with the Kamensky's and their son Gavrel who is studying to be a rabbi. After several months, Raisa manages to get hired on at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory as a seamstress, thus setting the stage for the tragedy. Gradually Raisa begins to fit into American society, taking extra classes to learn English and even falling in love. But is she destined to lose everything, the man she loves, even her own life when tragedy strikes?

Friesner works in many details about young immigrants coming to America, the promise and expectation of a better life and the difficulties faced due to language barriers, poverty and discrimination which help us to form an understanding of life in America at the beginning of the last century. We learn how workers were taken advantage of in sweatshops and how they organized and fought to obtain respect and decent, safe working conditions. Friesner also portrays how segregated American society was at this time, with each ethnic group having it's own insular community often prejudiced towards outsiders as well as the strong class distinctions that still existed at this time.

Ultimately, despite the tragic setting of the novel, readers will be satisfied and will have learned much about American society during the early 1900's.

Highly recommended.

Book Details:

Threads and Flames by Esther Friesner
New York: Viking Group 2010
390 pp.

Cate of the Lost Colony by Lisa Klein

Cate of the Lost Colony is a fictional account of the settlement of Roanoke Island in Virginia Colony in 1587.
The story begins in England with Catherine Archer who is taken into the Queen's service as a lady-in-waiting. Catherine's father died during fighting in the Netherlands and she is brought to London, as a favour for the sacrifice of her father to his country.

Catherine soon becomes infatuated with the much older Sir Walter Ralegh, Queen Elizabeth's Sir "Warter". Ralegh was a favourite in the Elizabethan court for many years. Soon Catherine Archer and Walter Ralegh are corresponding and meeting on occasion - an possible scenario given court life in the 1500's. Ralegh in real life, did in fact seduce one of the Queen's maids and ended up marrying her so it's quite possible that he would be interested in a character such as Catherine Archer.
However, when Elizabeth discovers the relationship between Catherine and Walter she imprisons Catherine in the Tower of London and then banishes Catherine to the New World - specifically to the colony Ralegh is setting up on Roanoke Island.
Catherine is thrilled to be going to the New World because she hopes that she will finally be free to be with Walter Ralegh whom she assumes is also making the voyage. She also envisions herself and the colonists making the Indians of the New World good subjects of the Queen. From this point on, Klein explores what might have happened to the 100 colonists who land on Roanoke Island and who are never heard of again.
Klein's Cate is a heroine who is both brave and intelligent. Cate of the Lost Colony is a romanticized fictional account of what happened on Roanoke Island. I found the second half of the book more interesting than Klein's account of life in the Elizabethan court at the beginning of the novel. I appreciated the Cast of Characters at the front of the book but would have also liked a map to help me understand the location of the colony in the New World:

I highly recommend Cate of the Lost Colony for teen fans of historical fiction.


You can read an account of the first colony of Roanoke, which consisted of 100 colonists who settled there in 1585, online. It was written by Ralf Lane who was in charge of the colony under Sir Richard Grenville.

Book Details:
Cate of the Lost Colony by Lisa Klein
New York: Bloomsbury 2010
329pp.

When Rose Wakes by Christopher Golden

When Rose Wakes by Christopher Golden is the penultimate twisted fairytale. Golden takes the basic story of Sleeping Beauty and adds elements of horror while bringing it into a modern high school setting that young adults can relate to.

Rose DuBois wakes after a two year coma to find that she doesn't really remember anything or anyone from the time before the coma. She recognizes her two aunts, Fay and Suzette who tell her that they use to live in France and that they have brought her to America to receive the finest medical treatment possible. After going through physiotherapy, Rose is brought home to Boston's Beacon Hill to live with her aunts.

As she struggles to regain her life, Rose is haunted by terrifying nightmares she cannot understand but which seem vaguely familiar and appear to hold the clue to her past. When she mentions the dreams to her aunts they try to comfort her by telling her that they are "only dreams" that have no meaning.Instead they tell her to drink a bitter tea they make for her every day to help her regain her memory.

Eventually, Rose begins classes as a sophomore at St. Bridget's High School in Boston's Back Bay where she is known as "Coma Girl". Rose struggles to fit in and cope with the typical high school cliques and conflicts. It doesn't take her long to meet and befriend a handsome junior, tall, muscular, Jared Munoz and make a best friend in Kylie O'Neill. But she also makes enemies with Courtney Sauer who takes an instant dislike to Rose often becoming confrontational with her.

As time goes on bizarre happenings continue to plague Rose. Besides the increasingly detailed nightmares, there is also a strange woman who Rose discovers is following her as well as the creepy presence of black crows who appear to be watching her every move. Her Aunt's persistent warnings that she stay away from boys - all boys move Rose to rebel against their warnings and to pursue a relationship with Jared. She feels that Aunt Suzette and Aunt Fay are out of touch and unreasonably old-fashioned. Yet there are hints from her nightmares that guys are dangerous.

Eventually Rose begins to realize that her dreams are very similar to the fairytale story of Sleeping Beauty.Is she the princess? Is there a curse on her too and if so what part of it includes love and intimacy?

It isn't until Rose is violently attacked at school by Courtney that her Aunts tell her the truth about her past,the present about themselves and about the actual curse on her. I won't reveal how Golden weaves into the modern setting the story of Rose's past and the Sleeping Beauty fairytale because that would simply give away too much plot. But from this point on, the story moves breathtakingly fast. There is an epic battle between good and bad that involves Rose, her Aunts and their spurned sister.

The ending is bizarre and unsatisfying in some aspects. For me, this bizarreness ruined the book. It was strangely out of character with the situations and the characters involved. If someone were really trying to kill you and you knew they would never ever stop, would you spare them? I also found the entire premise of the fairytale element unworkable because the present day situation and that which occurred in the past is actually based on the dishonourable behaviour of Rose's father, the Duke of Rigauld.

There is an element of horror in this story but it's not overwhelming and Christopher Golden writing is well done in this regard. I wished there had been more character development for Rose's aunts but Golden does a great job developing the sweet romance between Rose and Jared. It is this romantic element which helps to hold the reader's interest in the middle of the novel when there is not much action occurring.

Overall, I think most young readers will enjoy When Rose Wakes, especially if they are fans of Golden's previous books. When Rose Wakes is a good blend of romance, mystery and horror. But I hazard that they will ultimately be very disappointed in the bizarre ending.

Book Details:

When Rose Wakes by Christopher Golden
New York: Gallery Books (Simon & Schuster) 2010

312pp