Wild Ginger: A Novel

Anchee Min

HMH, Jan 1, 2004 - Fiction - 240 pages

Two girls come of age during the horrors of China’s Cultural Revolution in this novel by the national bestselling author of Empress Orchid.
 
The young and beautiful Wild Ginger is only in elementary school, but has already survived hell through her sheer iron will. Singled out by the Red Guards for her “foreign-colored eyes,” she has seen her deceased father branded a traitor and her mother commit suicide under the oppressive weight of persecution. But the young Wild Ginger will not allow herself to be taken down. Nor will she turn her back on other martyrs—like sweet Maple, daughter of a teacher of Chinese history, survivor of a labor camp, and victim of daily brutal beatings by a gang girl called Hot Pepper.
 
While the two become fast friends over their shared ostracism, it is Wild Ginger who will take her Maoist principles to the extreme, becoming no less than a national model for the revolutionary Communist doctrine. But when both self-possessed young girls begin to feel a prohibited romantic love for the same boy, all three of them will face mortal danger.
 
In this novel, the author of Pearl of China and the New York Times Notable Book Red Azalea “continues her extraordinarily acute inquiry into the wounded psyches of martyrs…and survivors of China's horrific Cultural Revolution… As in all her unsparing, compelling, and transcendent books, Min discerns both the vulnerability and strength of individuals and, more disturbingly, unveils the eroticism of pain. Given our own times, Min's taut and compassionate tale of oppressed teenagers kept in ignorance of the wider world, children brainwashed into performing acts of violence and self-destruction, is especially urgent.”—Booklist 
 

What people are saying

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - HerbThomas - LibraryThing

Wild Ginger, by Anchee Min, depicts the fanaticism and cruelty that swept China during the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). In the story, Hot Pepper, a teenage girl who leads Red Guards in Shanghai ...

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - Dream24 - LibraryThing

This was so messed up! Honestly, a generation lost, no thanks to Mao and his Army. Ugh! His 'philosophies' and 'army' (aka bullies) leave a distaste in my mouth! He's not so much of a leader than a ...

About the author

Anchee Min was born in Shanghai in 1957. At seventeen she was sent to a labor collective, where a talent scout for Madame Mao’s Shanghai Film Studio recruited her to work as a movie actress. She came to the United States in 1984 with the help of actress Joan Chen. Her memoir, Red Azalea, was named one of the New York Times Notable Books of 1994 and was an international bestseller, with rights sold in twenty countries. Her novels Becoming Madame Mao and Empress Orchid were published to critical acclaim and were national bestsellers. Her two other novels, Katherine and Wild Ginger, were published to wonderful reviews and impressive foreign sales.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Wild Ginger: A Novel
• Author: Anchee Min
• Publisher: HMH, 2004
• ISBN: 0547349378, 9780547349374
• Length: 240 pages
• Subjects: Fiction / Historical / General; Fiction / Literary; Fiction / Political; Fiction / Women