She is desperately excited to explore not only the foreign land with all its alien culture but also the role of a wife and all the pleasures that come with it… In no time at all Constance is shocked on both accounts. China stuns her with its barbaric and improper behaviour which, almost against her will, begins to tease her imagination. At the same time, Mr Henry Baird, despairing of his sinful desires, proves unable to indulge Constance’s wishes. The marriage, failing from the beginning, spirals further and further out of control as Constance, aided by her only ally Kate, inadvertently becomes a famous ‘Devil Woman’ throughout the region and faces an audience with the Empress herself. As her new life unfolds, Constance finds herself tortured by desire, teetering on the edge of love and caught up in a dangerous whirlwind of international politics. She ricochets between the Chinese extremes of complete intimacy and deadly violence as they head slowly into war. What does ‘The Crimson Pagoda’ promise? ‘The Crimson Pagoda’ is a gripping and engaging historical romance by a master of the genre. Praise for Christopher Nicole: ‘Well-researched…Evocative descriptions of scenery and edifices, and exact period dialogue’ – Historical Novels Society Christopher Nicole was born and brought up in British Guyana and the West Indies. His output of books has been prolific and many of his novels are historical with a Caribbean background.

    With Polo's book, The Travels of Marco Polo, as their guide, they journeyed over 25,000 miles becoming the first to retrace his entire path by land and sea without resorting to helicopters or airplanes. Surviving deadly skirmishes and capture in Afghanistan, they were the first Westerners in a generation to cross its ancient forgotten passageway to China, the Wakhan Corridor. Their camel caravan on the southern Silk Road encountered the deadly singing sands of the Taklamakan and Gobi deserts. In Sumatra, where Polo was stranded waiting for trade winds, they lived with the Mentawai tribes, whose culture has remained unchanged since the Bronze Age. They became among the first Americans granted visas to enter Iran, where Polo fulfilled an important mission for Kublai Khan. Accompanied by 200 stunning full-color photographs, the text provides a fascinating account of the lands and peoples the two hardy adventurers encountered during their perilous journey. The authors' experiences are remarkably similar to descriptions from Polo's account of his own travels and life. Laden with adventure, humor, diplomacy, history, and art, this book is compelling proof that travel is the enemy of bigotry--a truth that resonates from Marco Polo's time to our own.

    Tina yearns for this new setting to bring her the zen-like inner peace she's always heard about on infomercials. Instead, she becomes a totally exasperated fish out of water, doing wacky things like stealing the shoes of a shifty delivery man, spraying local women with a bidet hose, and contemplating the murder of her new pet cricket.It takes the friendship of an elderly tai chi instructor, a hot Mandarin tutor, and several mah-jongg-tile-slinging expats to bring Tina closer to a culture she doesn't understand, the dream job she never knew existed, and the self she has always sought. Fish Heads and Duck Skin will resonate with anyone who has ever wondered who they are, why they were put here, and how they ever lived before eating pan-fried pork buns.

    But the "poison dragons" of misfortune shatter his orderly existence. First, when his village is threatened by a vicious civil war, his family stability is threatened by his second son, a brutal rebel officer. Meanwhile, Yun Cai struggles to free an old friend, P'ei Ti, from a hellish prison—no easy task when P'ei Ti is the rebels' most valuable hostage, and Yun Cai sees himself only as a frightened old man. Throughout his ordeals, Yun Cai draws from the glittering memories of his youth, when he journeyed to the capital to study poetry, joined the upper ranks of the civil service, and secured the friendship of P'ei Ti. Above all, he reflects Su Lin, a great love he won and lost, and for which he paid with his freedom and almost his life. Yun Cai is forced to reconsider all that he is and all that he has ever been in order to summon the wit and courage to confront the warlord General An-Shu and his beautiful but cruel consort, the Lady Ta-Chi.

    Hanstedt and his wife and three children--aged 9, 6, and 3--lived in Hong Kong for a year, a year beset by culture clash, vicious bullies, hospital visits, M&Ms, and the worst traffic jam you've ever seen.Through the eyes of the earnest if sometimes clueless Hanstedt family, you'll discover a world you've never known before. But in the end, Hong Konged is about place and family and what it is that makes us human--no matter who we are or where we live.

    From Inquiry to Academic Writing: A Text and Reader demystifies cross-curricular thinking and writing by breaking it down into a series of comprehensible habits and skills that students can learn in order to join in. The extensive thematic reader opens up thought-provoking conversations being held throughout the academy and in the culture at large. Read the preface.

    It was in their steep Himalayan villages that McHugh came to know another culture, witnessing and learning the Buddhist appreciation for equanimity in moments of precious joy and inevitable sorrow.Love and Honor in the Himalayas is McHugh's gripping ethnographic memoir based on research among the Gurungs conducted over a span of fourteen years. As she chronicles the events of her fieldwork, she also tells a story that admits feeling and involvement, writing of the people who housed her in the terms in which they cast their relationship with her, that of family. Welcomed to call her host Ama and become a daughter in the household, McHugh engaged in a strong network of kin and friendship. She intimately describes, with a sure sense of comedy and pathos, the family's diverse experiences of life and loss, self and personhood, hope, knowledge, and affection. In mundane as well as dramatic rituals, the Gurungs ever emphasize the importance of love and honor in everyday life, regardless of circumstances, in all human relationships. Such was the lesson learned by McHugh, who arrived a young woman facing her own hardships and came to understand--and experience--the power of their ways of being.While it attends to a particular place and its inhabitants, Love and Honor in the Himalayas is, above all, about human possibility, about what people make of their lives. Through the compelling force of her narrative, McHugh lets her emotionally open fieldwork reveal insight into the privilege of joining a community and a culture. It is an invitation to sustain grace and kindness in the face of adversity, cultivate harmony and mutual support, and cherish life fully.

    This was supposed to be a story of how Chinese parents are better at raising kids than Western ones. But instead, it's about a bitter clash of cultures, a fleeting taste of glory, and how I was humbled by a thirteen-year-old." —Amy ChuaAll decent parents want to do what's best for their children. What Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother reveals is that the Chinese just have a totally different idea of how to do that. Western parents try to respect their children's individuality, encouraging them to pursue their true passions and providing a nurturing environment. The Chinese believe that the best way to protect your children is by preparing them for the future and arming them with skills, strong work habits, and inner confidence. Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother chronicles Chua's iron-willed decision to raise her daughters, Sophia and Lulu, her way—the Chinese way—and the remarkable results her choice inspires.Here are some things Amy Chua would never allow her daughters to do:- have a playdate- be in a school play- complain about not being in a school play- not be the #1 student in every subject except gym and drama- play any instrument other than the piano or violin- not play the piano or violinThe truth is Lulu and Sophia would never have had time for a playdate. They were too busy practicing their instruments (two to three hours a day and double sessions on the weekend) and perfecting their Mandarin.Of course no one is perfect, including Chua herself. Witness this scene:"According to Sophia, here are three things I actually said to her at the piano as I supervised her practicing:- Oh my God, you're just getting worse and worse.- I'm going to count to three, then I want musicality.- If the next time's not PERFECT, I'm going to take all your stuffed animals and burn them!"But Chua demands as much of herself as she does of her daughters. And in her sacrifices—the exacting attention spent studying her daughters' performances, the office hours lost shuttling the girls to lessons—the depth of her love for her children becomes clear. Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother is an eye-opening exploration of the differences in Eastern and Western parenting—and the lessons parents and children everywhere teach one another.

    After months of exclusive conversations, years of extensive research, and in-depth interviews with Onassis's friends, lovers and rivals, Evans produced the only true, full account of the charismatic and ruthless Aristotle Onassis. To be a major ABC miniseries in February. 32 pages of photos.

    Through her father’s second marriage to a Eurasian woman, and their subsequent move to Hong Kong, she learnt more about the Chinese attitudes to business and to family, and the strength of the Chinese in exile.Since living in London and California, Adeline Yen Mah has studied Chinese thought, looking at both the strengths and weaknesses which it gives those who follow it and now, in ‘Watching the Tree’, she takes us on a journey through the Chinese language, religions and history, using both Chinese proverbs and her own experiences, to bring to us an understanding of the richness of China and the ways that we can take and use some of the wisdom for ourselves in the West.

    He found master Li Kao, a scholar with a slight flaw in his character. Together, they set out to find the Great Root of Power, the only possible cure.The quest led them to a host of truly memorable characters, multiple wonders, incredible adventures—and strange coincidences, which were really not coincidences at all. And it involved them in an ancient crime that still perturbed the serenity of Heaven. Simply and charmingly told, this is a wry tale, a sly tale, and a story of wisdom delightfully askew. Once read, its marvels and beauty will not easily fade from the mind.The author claims that this is a novel of an ancient China that never was. But, oh…it should have been!

    Our culture once rewarded independence; now it rewards victimhood. Parents once taught their kids how to fend for themselves; now, any parent who tries may get a visit from the police.In Not a Day Care, Dr. Everett Piper, president of Oklahoma Wesleyan University and author of the viral essay, "This Is Not a Day Care. It's a University!," takes a hard look at what's happening around the country--including the demand for "safe spaces" and trigger warnings at universities like Yale, Brandeis, and Oberlin--and digs in his heels against the sad and dangerous infantilization of the American spirit.

    The collection takes us from England to Asia with stops in Australia and the United States and it proves the point that disgusting old people are to be found just about everywhere. We enter the troubled minds of murderers, bank robbers, practical jokers, serial killers, perverts and just regular old liars all of whom are old enough to know better. You'll doubtless recognize people you know and be forced to admit to a few wiles of your own.

    The dagongmei are women in their late teens and early twenties who move from rural areas to urban centers to work in factories. Because of state laws dictating that those born in the countryside cannot permanently leave their villages, and familial pressure for young women to marry by their late twenties, the dagongmei are transient labor. They undertake physically exhausting work in urban factories for an average of four or five years before returning home. The young women are not coerced to work in the factories; they know about the twelve-hour shifts and the hardships of industrial labor. Yet they are still eager to leave home. Made in China is a compelling look at the lives of these women, workers caught between the competing demands of global capitalism, the socialist state, and the patriarchal family.Pun Ngai conducted ethnographic work at an electronics factory in southern China’s Guangdong province, in the Shenzhen special economic zone where foreign-owned factories are proliferating. For eight months she slept in the employee dormitories and worked on the shop floor alongside the women whose lives she chronicles. Pun illuminates the workers’ perspectives and experiences, describing the lure of consumer desire and especially the minutiae of factory life. She looks at acts of resistance and transgression in the workplace, positing that the chronic pains—such as backaches and headaches—that many of the women experience are as indicative of resistance to oppressive working conditions as they are of defeat. Pun suggests that a silent social revolution is underway in China and that these young migrant workers are its agents.

    The text integrates the new with the old, simplifying explanations, shortening sentences, and improving readability. Hundreds of illustrations cover new developments, espeially those relating to the foreign automotive industry and federal laws governing automotive air pollution, safety, and fuel economy. The Tenth Edition contains two four-color illustrated sections. Many chapters end with vocabulary words and "think-type" review questions, in addition to the National Institute of Automotive Service Excellence (ASE) style of multiple-choice questions. For schools seeking program certification by the national Automotive Technicians Education Foundation (NATEF), the high-priority items from their diagnosis, service, and repair task lists have been included.