Wild Swans

"I realized then that when people are happy they become kind."  "Having been brought up in a privileged position, I did not realize that in China dignity was a luxury scarcely available to those who were not privileged."  "I could understand ignorance, but I could not accept its glorification, still less its right to rule."  "In bringing out and nourishing the worst in people, Mao had created a moral wasteland and a land of hatred.  But how much individual responsibility ordinary people should share, I could not decide."  This amazing book is the history of a grandmother, mother and daughter who lived in the last 100 years in China.  The grandmother was a foot-bound concubine of a War Lord, the mother is a devout communist (until it all goes wrong), and the daughter is an intelligent girl whose country closed schools for 8 years during the Cultural Revolution.  The book is banned in China for the truth it exposes.  I never realized how bad things really were there (as it was so well-hidden from the western world!).  Poppy read this book cover-to-cover and that's rare for him!  It's enthralling and engrossing and I promise you will learn so much, mostly to be grateful for democracy!  But it's not a "beach read"--you have to dig in and it will leave your head spinning--but what a ride.  I feel like I've taken a full semester course in Chinese history.