false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166052896m/9755.jpg 9755 4 From the acclaimed author of <i>River Town</i> comes a rare portrait, both intimate and epic, of twenty-first-century China as it opens its doors to the outside world. A century ago, outsiders saw China as a place where nothing ever changes. Today the country has become one of the most dynamic regions on earth. That sense of time -- the contrast between past and present, and the rhythms that emerge in a vast, ever-evolving country -- is brilliantly illuminated by Peter Hessler in <i>Oracle Bones</i>, a book that explores the human side of China's transformation. Hessler tells the story of modern-day China and its growing links to the Western world as seen through the lives of a handful of ordinary people. In addition to the author, an American writer living in Beijing, the narrative follows Polat, a member of a forgotten ethnic minority, who moves to the United States in search of freedom; William Jefferson Foster, who grew up in an illiterate family and becomes a teacher; Emily, a migrant factory worker in a city without a past; and Chen Mengjia, a scholar of oracle-bone inscriptions, the earliest known writing in East Asia, and a man whose tragic story has been lost since the Cultural Revolution. All are migrants, emigrants, or wanderers who find themselves far from home, their lives dramatically changed by historical forces they are struggling to understand. Peter Hessler excavates the past and puts a remarkable human face on the history he uncovers. In a narrative that gracefully moves between the ancient and the present, the East and the West, Hessler captures the soul of a country that is undergoing a momentous change before our eyes. 2129949 1 5 2006 Oracle Bones: A Journey Between China's Past and Present total:778|5:245|4:350|3:143|2:31|1:9| 778 3125 1322 202 4 1 false false Tue May 06 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Mon Apr 28 08:06:37 -0700 2008 Tue May 06 06:31:14 -0700 2008
Hessler journeys between China's past and present through the parallel stories of oracle bones (pieces of bone used in royal divination and some of the first chinese writings in history),3 the studen...more...]]> 4 1 false false Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Sat Dec 22 05:52:19 -0800 2007 Sat Dec 22 06:03:40 -0800 2007 more...]]> 3 1 false false Thu Nov 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Tue Dec 18 08:44:58 -0800 2007 Tue Dec 18 08:46:54 -0800 2007 more...]]> 4 0 false false Sat Dec 20 02:44:39 -0800 2008 Sat Dec 20 02:44:53 -0800 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Jan 19 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Jan 20 16:02:30 -0800 2009 Tue Jan 20 16:06:24 -0800 2009 more...]]> 0 0 false false Thu Feb 05 09:47:23 -0800 2009 Thu Feb 05 09:47:23 -0800 2009 Hessler, Beijing correspondent for the New Yorker, freelance journalist, and the author of River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze (2001), a memoir of his experiences as an English teacher for the Peace Corps in China's Sichuan Province, describes a world closed to most Westerners. The writing is smart...

more...]]> 3 1 false false Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Tue Mar 27 20:57:54 -0700 2007 Tue Mar 27 21:00:14 -0700 2007 more...]]> 4 0 false false Fri Feb 06 22:42:11 -0800 2009 Fri Feb 06 23:09:24 -0800 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Fri Jan 09 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Sat Nov 29 11:34:06 -0800 2008 Sat Jan 10 01:53:15 -0800 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Fri Aug 14 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Tue Jul 07 17:52:13 -0700 2009 Tue Aug 18 06:10:01 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Sun Jan 11 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Sat Nov 29 16:36:41 -0800 2008 Sun Jan 11 12:10:36 -0800 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Sat May 16 06:11:30 -0700 2009 Wed Aug 19 18:25:37 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Wed May 13 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Mar 23 21:23:55 -0700 2009 Sat Oct 03 23:54:01 -0700 2009 River Town. Hessler's life story (at least the public version) is as compelling as those of the ordinary Chinese he follows in his new book, and reads like a fairy tale version of the writer's career. After gra...more...]]> 4 0 false false Tue Sep 16 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Mon Aug 25 07:38:50 -0700 2008 Tue Sep 16 01:36:31 -0700 2008 1
I particularly liked the emph...more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon Jun 30 23:06:59 -0700 2008 Sat Jul 05 20:42:28 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 0 false false Fri Jul 04 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Fri May 23 06:38:36 -0700 2008 Sun Jul 06 17:58:14 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Wed Oct 17 16:58:36 -0700 2007 Wed Oct 17 20:47:56 -0700 2007 more...]]> 4 0 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Mon Sep 03 19:10:46 -0700 2007 Tue Sep 04 19:33:37 -0700 2007
http://peacecorpsonline.org/messages/mes......more...]]> 5 1 false false Thu Nov 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Fri Jun 22 08:02:29 -0700 2007 Sat Nov 03 18:38:36 -0700 2007 more...]]> 3 0 true false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Sat Oct 11 23:10:40 -0700 2008 Thu Oct 23 22:09:45 -0700 2008 The longitudinal study of a few key characters, interwoven into stories of China's present and past, is an interesting approach for...more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=9755