Red Sister, Ching-ling, married Sun Yat-sen, founding father of the Chinese republic, and later became Mao’s vice-chair. Written in a very readable prose, this book captured the lives of the Soong sisters, Big sister, Red sister and Little sister, each of them making served their positions as women who help to shape China as it is. Ich jedyną nadzieją okazywały się kobiety, które potrafiły używać swojej siły wpływu do sterowania mężczyznami u władzy – i tutaj oto mamy możliwą przyczynę zbanowania tej książki w patriarchalnych Chinach. They remained close emotionally, even when they embraced opposing political camps and Ching-ling dedicated herself to destroying her two sisters' worlds. Although Chiang did in fact lead the resistance to Japan (1937-45) despite Beijing’s propaganda crediting Mao Ze-dong, senior American military officers assigned as his aides universally regarded him as an utterly incompetent soldier and blamed him for the loss to the Communists.

Red Sister, Ching-ling, married the ‘Father of China’, Sun Yat-sen, and rose to be Mao’s vice-chair.Big Sister married H H Kung (‘Kung’) who was a business man in name only because Big Sister was the brains and driving force behind him and Sun, both of whom she manipulated. The author was pretty objective and neutral in conveying the historical narratives of these characters. After the CCP defeated the Nationalists in 1949, Qingling served as Mao Zedong’s vice-chairman on the mainland, while Meiling followed Chiang Kai-shek into exile in Taiwan. Before wading into the sisters’ lives, she devotes detailed chapters to two men: Sun, who amassed power mostly by being a ruthless, thuggish blowhard; and Charlie Soong, the paterfamilias of the Soong clan, a former Methodist preacher turned wealthy businessman and underground revolutionary. Out of her own pocket, she had converted the Lido Cabaret into a field hospital of 300 beds and set up a children’s hospital with a hundred beds.

This book ended out on my list due to a challenge from a friend to read something way out of my comfort zone.Some of the data that are collected include the number of visitors, their source, and the pages they visit anonymously.

The Soong sisters are not the only highlights, but also their 3 brothers and a powerful political dynasty this family forged.

Chang relates a strange story that explains how Chiang managed to lose to Mao even though his armies were battle-tested and much stronger than the guerrillas who made up the Red Army. The Dowager Empress emerges in Jung Chang’s book as a committed and effective reformer, not the greedy and self-indulgent figure portrayed in the Communists’s rewriting of history.