Author:        Lisa See

Publisher:     Random House

Website:      www.lisasee.com

ISBN:           978-0-8129-7522-2

Pages:         284 Trade Paperback

Type:          Fiction: Women’s

                  Fiction: Historical

Purchase:  $11.20 @ Amazon.com (HERE)

Sample:       Read Chapter One (HERE)

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The Storyline (Video From Lisa See’s Website):

The Review:

My regular readers already know how much I love Lisa See’s writing.  Peony In Love is my second experience with See’s amazing pen and I’m nearing my read and review of Shanghai Girls.  Lisa and I are both planning on trying to meet Lisa at the UCLA Book Event in April (fingers crossed). 

Knowing that I already have a penchant for See’s writing, I bet you can guess that I have yet another glowing review for Peony.   Let’s start with the storyline and what I took from the book.  This book is a love story, but it is much more than that.  This book takes the reader beyond what looks like “romantic love” and shows to what depths true love exists within the heart and soul of a woman.  Peony, our narrator and heroine, falls for a handsome stranger, Ren, whom she met while watching a live production of The Peony Pavilion (an opera) at her father’s estate.  Over a period of three days, Peony and Ren fall in love.  However, the tragic flaw of their love is that Peony is betrothed.  Little does she know that it is Ren who she is destined to marry.  Thinking that she’ll be bound to another in her arranged marriage, Peony starves herself and falls victim to “love sickness.”  At 16, Peony meets her death just days before her wedding to Ren.  This, I believe, is when the story gets incredibly good. 

The book tells Peony’s tale in her afterlife.  As such, she provides both a first person, but also an almost omniscient point of view in the way she explains all that she sees on the earth below.  Her soul is trapped and her spirit is unable to progress to the appropriate ancestral level in Heaven.  Why she’s trapped  is the true lesson in this book (or, at least in my opinion).  The reader remains on Peony’s journey over decades and sits beside her as she clings to her love for Ren and yearns for her soul to transcend.  Peony watches Ren re-marry and is tethered to the two women (one after another, not simultaneously) who become her sister-wives.  The sister-wives, including Peony, are all tied together through their hope for qing (the most noble and deep of all loves between a man and a woman) and their connection to The Peony Pavilion.

There is more to this wonderful book than the love story.  As always, See delivers great historical depth to Peony.  Her research into her books is impeccable!  I learned much about the Manchu reign and the massacre in Yangzhou (totally unbelievable what these people went through).  As in Snow Flower & The Secret Fan, See provides more in-depth information on arranged marriages, foot binding, architecture, familial structure, religious beliefs, dietary customs, and ancient medicinal treatments.  What is really fantastic is how much of this story’s historical roots are weaved into this story.  I walked away after reading this book really feeling that I’ve learned something about Chinese History and culture.   

Now for the “small stuff.”  I love the fact that I now know what congee is.  I know what golden lilies are and why men fancied them.  Every time I read about the Chinese mandarin ducks, I smile.  I know what a Palanquin is and why it’s used.  It’s almost like one book gets you prepared for the next, but See also takes the time to consider first time readers in each book to ensure they understand. 

What saddened me about this book and its story was one repeating fact…. women were worthless in Chinese society.  It was mentioned that they weren’t worth the price of salt.  As a reader, every time that I was reminded of this fact, I felt a horrible ache and emptiness in my stomach.  I can’t imagine living under such conditions in which my life would be a burden to a family and worthless to a husband (well, other than to bear sons). 

I was struck by the following quotations in the book:

“When my mother began to recite what she’d written, I was struck through the heart.

  ‘The trees are bare.  In the distance, the honks of mourning geese.  If only my tears of blood could dye red the blossoms of the plum tree.  But I will never make it to spring…’

I joined in for the last two lines.

  ‘My heart is empty and my life has no value anymore.  Each moment a thousand tears.’ “

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“To have Ren – my  poet, my love, my life – agree was like having pearls poured into my heart.”

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” ‘Why is it,’ she asked Li Shu, ‘that so many women’s thoughts have been like flowers in the wind, drifting off with the current and vanishing without a trace?’ “

You Can Meet Lisa See…

I found on her website that she has some book signings coming up that are here in California.  If you are nearby any of these locations and a fan… you’ll be in for a treat.

 March 14, 2009

10:00 a.m. -1p.m.
American Association of University Women
Alhambra-San Gabriel Branch Presents
Literary Brunch and Book Signing
Featuring Lisa See
Church of the Good Shepherd, United Methodist Church
Jordan Hall, 400 W. Duarte Rd.
Arcadia, CA
For information: 626-570-9784

March 21, 2009

9:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m
Fundraiser Brunch
Delta Nu Chapter of the
Delta Kappa Gamma Society International Presents
Literary Brunch and Book Signing
Covina Woman’s Club
128 S. San Jose
Covina, CA
For information and tickets call:
Diane at (626) 335-5926 or
Jackie at (626) 334-9892

April 25-25

L.A. Times Book Festival
UCLA campus
Westwood, CA 

 

Next on My Lisa See List:

On Sher’s “Out of 10 Scale:”

In rating this book in the genre: Women’s Fiction/Historical Fiction, I would rate this book an 9 out of 10!  I gave Snow Flower a 10 out of 10 because truthfully, I did like it a bit more than Peony.  Peony brought much to me, specifically thinking about bringing the love inside my soul with me to my “after life” in Heaven.  I’d like to believe that true love never dies, that it is timeless, self-less, and a part of your soul forever.  I think that Peony would agree with me!

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