Secret of a Thousand Beauties

November 15, 2014
Set in 1930s China, Yip's latest intrigue follows a runaway "ghost wife" as she finds a place in the world amid imperial loyalists and the rumblings of revolution.At 17, Spring Swallow is about to become a "ghost wife," married to an unborn baby (he died during a miscarriage) and tied to her "husband's" family. She runs away on her wedding day and is lucky enough to be taken in by Aunty Peony, who operates an embroidery studio. Spring Swallow lives and works there with the other sad-story girls, Purple, Leilei and Little Doll, while the imperious Aunty Peony teaches the ancient art of Su embroidery. They have a big commission from Peking and just six months to finish it, but Spring Swallow bristles at Aunty Peony's rules-among them a vow of celibacy-and finds solace in climbing a nearby mountain. She writes poetry on the rocks and is surprised to find that someone has written back. She and Shen Feng finally meet, fall in love and are separated in short order-he's a revolutionary on a mission. Meanwhile, Spring Swallow has been sneaking into Aunty Peony's room and rummaging through her things. She discovers a shocking secret: Aunty Peony was an embroiderer for the royal household and mistress of the last emperor of China. After a series of tragedies, Spring Swallow is once again destitute but is hired by an embroidery shop whose owner wants her for a daughter-in-law. But her new husband is a scoundrel, and after a miscarriage (of Shen Feng's baby), she is thrown out again, quickly finding a home with the Catholic missionaries and the love of an American priest. A runaway train of a plot, in which our heroine suffers four marriages, two pregnancies, three tragic deaths and too many coincidences in a two-year span to be believable, yet the narrative has a certain cheeky, boundless energy that propels the reader to a gratifying conclusion.

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November 15, 2014
Spring Swallow, a willful 17-year-old living in 1930s China, can't believe her wedding day has come to this. Betrothed to Wang Xing while they were both still in utero as a pact of friendship between their mothers, Spring Swallow expected that the marriage pact would dissolve after her groom's early death. Despite Wang Xing's death, their families decided the betrothal should remain unbroken. After fleeing her village on the day of the wedding, Spring Swallow finds shelter with Aunty Peony, an expert seamstress who has taken in a number of girls without homes in exchange for labor. Spring Swallow learns the highly detailed embroidery quickly, and her future is forever changed. Through the power of female friendship, self-determination, and guiding influences both spiritual and supernatural, this novel tells the inspiring, courageous story of Spring Swallow and her new sisters. Yip's prose is simple yet descriptive, immersing the reader in the sights, sounds, and smells of rural and urban China. Fans of Yip's previous novels and Anchee Min's latest memoir, The Cooked Seed (2013), will enjoy this emotionally poignant novel.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)