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The Book of Secrets by Xinran Xue
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The Book of Secrets

A Personal History of Betrayal in Red China

$22.05

Get for $14.99 with membership
Length 13 hours 3 minutes
Language English
Narrators Crystal Yu & Daniel York Loh

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Bloomsbury presents The Book of Secrets by Xinran Xue, read by Daniel York Loh and Crystal Yu.

The story of a family in modern China with a history of deceit, betrayal and political intrigue, and the communist party's long shadow over them, from the Cultural Revolution to today.

Following the lives of military intelligence officer Jie and his wife Moon, The Book of Secrets weaves recently found material into a narrative that not only illuminates the shadowy world of intelligence in China, but also the emotional tragedies that political extremism inflicted on those working within.

Drawing on Jie’s own vivid biography of his youth, Xinran pieces together his trajectory as he joins the great hope of the Chinese young – the Communist Party – and becomes a loyal cadre until the late 1970s when, as a chief in the security forces, he makes a decision that will poison his family against him.

This is a totally unique behind-the-scenes account of a family torn apart by the Tiananmen Square massacre and the attempts of Jie to finally open up the Chinese system to the people, pieced together from an extraordinary archive of personal diaries and letters.

Xinran is a British-Chinese author, journalist and activist. She was the host of a pioneering Chinese radio show ‘Words on the Night Breeze’, which invited women to discuss their issues live on air. Her first book, The Good Women of China (2002), recounted some of these stories and has been translated into over 30 languages and became an international bestseller. Her book The Promise was shortlisted for the society of Authors Translation Prize.

In August 2004, Xinran set up 'The Mothers' Bridge of Love' (MBL), which reaches out to Chinese children in all corners of the world. By creating a bridge of understanding between China and the West and between adoptive culture and birth culture, MBL ultimately wants to help bridge the huge poverty gap that still exists in many parts of China.

Daniel York Loh is a mixed-race British East Asian actor, writer, filmmaker and musician. His first full-length play, The Fu Manchu Complex, ran at Ovalhouse in 2013. Along with composer Craig Adams, he won the 2016 Perfect Pitch award to create an original stage musical, Sinking Water, based on events around the 2004 Morecambe Bay Chinese cockle-picker tragedy, which is currently being developed under commission by Theatre Royal Stratford East. He is one of 21 writers of colour featured in the collection of essays, The Good Immigrant, which won the 2016 Books Are My Bag Reader’s Choice award. He has served on the Equity Minority Ethnic Members Committee, is a founder member of British East Asian Artists and has worked with Act For Change to promote diversity in UK media.

Illustration of person sitting

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Limited-time offer

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Reviews

The Book Of Secrets is the remarkable story of [a] deeply dysfunctional family. The Book of Secrets [is] a particularly rare thing: a candid, insider account showing just how much the party knew and how much it covered up. No one has done more than Xinran to tell the truth about the lives of ordinary people in twentieth-century China. Her Book of Secrets is a tale of horror, redeemed as always by the story-teller’s warmth, grace and narrative grip. An extraordinary book of huge historical interest and value, exactly the kind of book that the Western world needs to read, to understand the complexity of the Chinese political worldview since 1949. An extraordinary firsthand account of Communist Party machinery at its most brutal and paranoid. Xinran's talent is to survey the vast tidal waves of history and focus in on the human lives floating rudderless in their wake. This is a wonderful and compelling read. Xinran recounts an epic journey through China's recent history with a rare passion and clarity. The tale is seen through the tragic experience of a once powerful family, whose suffering she describes as though it were her own. A youthful faith betrayed and a deep love unrequited make for the most poignant of stories. Expand reviews
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