A highly revealing, human-centered cultural inquiry.
The stories of four women who came of age during China’s economic boom.
When Yang, a columnist and Europe-China correspondent for the Financial Times, returned to her native China, she met other professionals who, like her, had been “left behind.” While their parents sought opportunities in the factories and cities, fueling the country’s opening to global manufacturing and trade contracts, these children were often raised by their grandparents and other relatives in rural villages. The author follows four women—Siyue, Leiya, Sam, and June—through their adolescence and early adulthood, delineating their experiences during China’s drastic transition to authoritarian capitalism. While their economic roots, family dynamics, and professional prospects vary, these four exemplify the country’s rapid, almost whiplash-inducing, change over the last two decades. Yang attends primarily to the individual dreams, relationships, and trajectories of these four women, but as their paths intersect with economic trends and political movements—from the trajectory of China’s stock market to modern Marxist activism—the author includes relevant commentary that grants fuller context to global headlines. Her treatment of a variety of relevant topics—oppressive labor conditions, the high stakes and competitive market around education, the lasting implications of the one-child policy, and government surveillance—is embedded in the roles her characters play as daughters, students, mothers, workers, and romantic partners. The overlap of the four women’s stories and their individual wrestling with the challenges presented by their country demystifies the too-easy narrative of China as a behemoth set on a linear path to superpower. Through these interlocking biographical sketches, Yang offers a fresh interpretation of the ongoing nature of China’s many upheavals, the actual effects of its oft-discussed policies, the cost of its meteoric economic growth, and the role a new generation of women is poised to play.
A highly revealing, human-centered cultural inquiry.Pub Date: July 2, 2024
ISBN: 9780593493908
Page Count: 296
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2024
A sharp, entertaining view of the news media from one of its star players.
The veteran newscaster reflects on her triumphs and hardships, both professional and private.
In this eagerly anticipated memoir, Couric (b. 1957) transforms the events of her long, illustrious career into an immensely readable story—a legacy-preserving exercise, for sure, yet judiciously polished and insightful, several notches above the fray of typical celebrity memoirs. The narrative unfolds through a series of lean chapters as she recounts the many career ascendency steps that led to her massively successful run on the Today Show and comparably disappointing stints as CBS Evening News anchor, talk show host, and Yahoo’s Global News Anchor. On the personal front, the author is candid in her recollections about her midlife adventures in the dating scene and deeply sorrowful and affecting regarding the experience of losing her husband to colon cancer as well as the deaths of other beloved family members, including her sister and parents. Throughout, Couric maintains a sharp yet cool-headed perspective on the broadcast news industry and its many outsized personalities and even how her celebrated role has diminished in recent years. “It’s AN ADJUSTMENT when the white-hot spotlight moves on,” she writes. “The ego gratification of being the It girl is intoxicating (toxic being the root of the word). When that starts to fade, it takes some getting used to—at least it did for me.” Readers who can recall when network news coverage and morning shows were not only relevant, but powerfully influential forces will be particularly drawn to Couric’s insights as she tracks how the media has evolved over recent decades and reflects on the negative effects of the increasing shift away from reliable sources of informed news coverage. The author also discusses recent important cultural and social revolutions, casting light on issues of race and sexual orientation, sexism, and the predatory behavior that led to the #MeToo movement. In that vein, she expresses her disillusionment with former co-host and friend Matt Lauer.
A sharp, entertaining view of the news media from one of its star players.Pub Date: Oct. 26, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-316-53586-1
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
An unflinching self-portrait.
The tumultuous life of a bisexual, autistic comic.
In her debut memoir, Scottish comedian Brady recounts the emotional turmoil of living with undiagnosed autism. “The public perception of autistics is so heavily based on the stereotype of men who love trains or science,” she writes, “that many women miss out on diagnosis and are thought of as studious instead.” She was nothing if not studious, obsessively focused on foreign languages, but she found it difficult to converse in her own language. From novels, she tried to gain “knowledge about people, about how they spoke to each other, learning turns of phrase and metaphor” that others found so familiar. Often frustrated and overwhelmed by sensory overload, she erupted in violent meltdowns. Her parents, dealing with behavior they didn’t understand—including self-cutting—sent her to “a high-security mental hospital” as a day patient. Even there, a diagnosis eluded her; she was not accurately diagnosed until she was 34. Although intimate friendships were difficult, she depicts her uninhibited sexuality and sometimes raucous affairs with both men and women. “I grew up confident about my queerness,” she writes, partly because of “autism’s lack of regard for social norms.” While at the University of Edinburgh, she supported herself as a stripper. “I liked that in a strip club men’s contempt of you was out in the open,” she admits. “In the outside world, misogyny was always hovering in your peripheral vision.” When she worked as a reporter for the university newspaper, she was assigned to try a stint as a stand-up comic and write about it; she found it was work she loved. After “about a thousand gigs in grim little pubs across England,” she landed an agent and embarked on a successful career. Although Brady hopes her memoir will “make things feel better for the next autistic or misfit girl,” her anger is as evident as her compassion.
An unflinching self-portrait.Pub Date: June 6, 2023
ISBN: 9780593582503
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Harmony
Review Posted Online: March 10, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2023
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