Women of the Silk
- Book Review,
by Gail Tsukiyama
From Publishers Weekly
An auspicious debut, this sensitively written, impressively researched novel covers 20 years in the life of Pei, a Chinese girl sent to work in a silk factory during the first decades of the 20th century. Quick-witted, inquisitive, spirited Pei spends her early childhood on a poverty-stricken fish farm; her uncommunicative parents consign her to the factory for the wages she will send home. Initially terrified, Pei soon settles into the communal routine, and finds the 12-hour factory day made bearable by the kindness of supervisors and fellow workers. Along with her best friend, Lin, she decides at 16 to go through the hairdressing ceremony, in which girls pledge to dedicate their lives to silk work instead of marrying, and move into the peaceful milieu of the "sisters' house." Details of the process of spinning silk, the close bonds among the sisterhood, and contrasts between the tradition-steeped existence the young women enjoy and the upheaval attending the new communist regime create a compelling narrative. Tsukiyama's simple, elegant and fluid prose weaves a vivid picture of rural China. In delicately evoking the silk workers' world, she has opened a window onto an aspect of China few outsiders ever see. Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
YA-- When Pei Chung is eight years old, her father leaves her at the house of Auntie Yee so that she can work in the silk factory. Her grief at the unexplained abandonment is softened by the kindness of Yee and the other girls, and slowly she begins to thrive in her new independence. The friendship between Pei and Lin, who is the support of her once wealthy and powerful family, is forged with the lives of the silk workers who begin to demand better conditions. The China of 1919-1938, when the Japanese threat became a reality, is woven into the threads of factory life and that of families faced with ruin. The characters are drawn with fine detail. Small village life contrasts vividly with an exciting visit to Canton, and ceremonies are exquisitely described. This fascinating story is beautifully written and slightly reminiscent of Pearl Buck's The Good Earth . YAs will find it a riveting story and an absorbing look at a country trying to deal with economic and political change. --Judy Sokoll, Fairfax County Public Library, VACopyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
Strangely stiff and predictable coming-of-age debut novel about a young Chinese girl's hardships in early-20th-century China. Protagonist Pei is Tsukiyama's rather lifeless exemplar of the difficult lives of Chinese women throughout history. Born into a typically patriarchal peasant family dominated by a cold father who undervalues women's lives, the adolescent Pei is sent off to a silk farm after a fortuneteller predicts she will be a ``nonmarrying'' (hence nonproductive) adult. In Yung Kee Village, Pei works alongside other Chinese girls and women similarly victimized. Many have been ousted from families for refusing arranged marriages; others have chosen family exile as a means of self-determination. Under the supervision of the warm, matriarchal Auntie Yee, these women form friendships emblematic of their new independence. Their nurturing community is initially untouched by the war with Japan raging miles away, and Pei is fascinated when some of her friends choose to enter a ``hairdressing'' ceremony and swear off marriage forever. But hardships intervene: monsoons, isolation, a strike, the war, and eventually fire and death disrupt the female commune. Pei returns home briefly to become reconciled with her parents, then symbolically sets off at novel's end on a voyage for freedom and independence. Unfortunately, Tsukiyama's narrative limps methodically from incident to incident; the book is more descriptive than dramatic--it feels like an outline, not a novel- -and Pei is too passive and unchanging a character to make the life-affirming ending resonate. Readers looking for a stirring story about Asian women's lives would be better off trying Sky Lee's Disappearing Moon Cafe (see above). -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Review
"Enlivened with an engrossing richness of detail, Women of the Silk provides a revealing look at the life and customs of China . . . succinct and delicate."
—The New York Times Book Review
"Evocative . . . warm-hearted."—Washington Post Book World
"A soft ring of feminism . . . languorous, almost dreamlike quality."—Booklist
"One of the lovliest first novels published this year."—San Francisco Chronicle
"A first novel exceptional for its exquisite writing and for its rich portrait of a woman's life in a China now lost. Her story is rendered with exceptional grace, with the clear, shining dignity of legend or song; Tsukiyama lends her voice to figures of women emboldened by their dream of growth and personal power."—Ingram
Book Description
In Women of the Silk Gail Tsukiyama takes her readers back to rural China in 1926, where a group of women forge a sisterhood amidst the reeling machines that reverberate and clamor in a vast silk factory from dawn to dusk. Leading the first strike the village has ever seen, the young women use the strength of their ambition, dreams, and friendship to achieve the freedom they could never have hoped for on their own. Tsukiyama's graceful prose weaves the details of "the silk work" and Chinese village life into a story of courage and strength.
About the Author
Born to a Chinese mother and a Japanese father in San Francisco, Gail Tsukiyama now lives in El Cerrito, California. Her novels include Dreaming Water, The Language of Threads, The Samurai's Garden, and Night of Many Dreams.
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