"This epic novel of a wide-eyed missionary and a rebellious woman thrust into China's Communist revolution is 'an excellent read, panoramic in scope' (Financial Times).
In 1931, young English-born missionary Jakob Kellner brings all the crusading passion of his untried Christian faith to a China racked by famine and bloody civil war. He burns to save the world's largest nation from Communism.
But when he is swept along on the cold, unforgiving Long March, Jakob becomes entangled with Mei-ling, a beautiful and fervent revolutionary. Soon, powerful new emotions challenge and reshape his faith—and entrap him forever in the vast country's tortured destiny.
Once held hostage by Red Guards in Peking for more than two years, author Anthony Grey traces the path of China's Communist party from its covert inception through purge and revolution. He crafts a portrait of China as a land of great beauty and harshness—of triumph and tragedy—in a sweeping narrative, rich in historical and cultural revelations."
"Joseph Sherman first visits Saigon, the capital of French colonial Cochin-China, in 1925 on a hunting expedition with his father, a US senator. He is lured back again and again as a traveler, a soldier, and then as a reporter by his fascination for the exotic land and for Lan, a mandarin's daughter he cannot forget. Over five decades Joseph's life becomes enmeshed with the political intrigues of two of Saigon's most influential families, the French colonist Devrauxs, and the native Trans-and inevitably with Vietnam's turbulent, war torn fate. He is there when the hatred of a million coolies rises against the French, and when the French Foreign Legion fights it's bloody last stand at Dien Bien Phu."
