Daughters of Shandong Audiobook

An Instant USA Today Bestseller a Good Morning America Buzz Pick and a People Book of the Week

A propulsive extraordinary novel about a mother and her daughters harrowing escape to Taiwan as the Communist revolution sweeps through China by debut author Eve J Chung based on her family story

Daughters are the Ang familys curse

In 1948 civil war ravages the Chinese countryside but in rural Shandong the wealthy landowning Angs are more concerned with their lack of an heir Hai is the eldest of four girls and spends her days looking after her sisters Headstrong Di who is just a year younger learns to hide in plain sight and their motherabused by the family for failing to birth a boyfinds her own small acts of rebellion in the kitchen As the Communist army closes in on their town the rest of the prosperous household flees leaving behind the girls and their mother because they view them as useless mouths to feed

Without an Ang male to punish the landseizing cadres choose Hai as the eldest child to stand trial for her familys crimes She barely survives their brutality Realizing the worst is yet to come the women plan their escape Starving and penniless but resourceful they forge travel permits and embark on a thousandmile journey to confront the family that abandoned them

From the countryside to the bustling city of Qingdao and onward to British Hong Kong and eventually Taiwan they witness the changing tide of a nation and the plight of multitudes caught in the wake of revolution But with the loss of their home and the life theyve known also comes new freedomto take hold of their fate to shake free of the bonds of their gender and to claim their own story

Told in assured evocative prose with impeccably drawn characters Daughters of Shandong is a hopeful powerful story about the resilience of women in war the enduring love between mothers daughters and sisters and the sacrifices made to lift up future generations