The life of a Chinese girl
Bewertet mit 2.5 Sternen
~First of all I want to thank Junying Kirk for the 2nd book (of this series) I won at Goodreds (2013). Without it I guess I wouldn´t have found this series and bought and read part one.
When I started reading The Same Moon I honestly was a bit confused. The time changed from 1981 back to 1980 and then again to 1981. But I quickly understand and got used to her writing style.
Written in the main characters (Pearl Zhang) point of view I was able to have a sight into her life in China and in the UK. The life she had while growing up in a country (China) I really had no knowledge about. To get to know how the Chinese people lived and thought in the 1980s (and before and after) was very interesting but also something I don´t like. I felt that the main character- Pearl- was trapped in a cage. She was so open-minded, curious and interested in travelling, books and music but couldn´t satisfy her love and passion for the things she loved and cared about, simply because she wasn´t allowed to. Somehow she just was trimmed to be the best in school, in her studies and later in her job. Luckily, those studies gave her the opportunity to leave the country later and to do all the things she always wanted to do.
After she fell in love with Yu as a teenager I really hoped that this book will be a bit romantic, although her parent’s didn´t approved of the relationship and forbid her to see Yu again. I hoped the whole time that they will find a way until that tragic moment happened. Throughout the book I felt like he was the only one who really loved her and who she really had loved. Pearl surely was attracted to other Men and had relationships and also was married (and had a child) but in my opinion Yu was the only one she ever really loved and who treated her the way a girl should be treated.
Before she went to the UK Pearl was finally able to travel a little in China before and after she married her husband. Unfortunately that stopped when she became pregnant and had to take care for her child- which is of course not a bad thing. It just kept her again from doing something she loved and just started doing.
In the UK Pearl started to change and got used to the British Culture. Not only was she finally visiting libraries and reading lots of books, she also went to parties and could travel through Europe- visiting France, Germany, Austria, etc. She got in touch with many different people of different nationalities and was able to get to know about the various ways of living and thinking each culture brings with it. I would say the UK was a chance for her to be free, to be free to live the way she wanted to live and to enjoy life a bit. No one was there to tell her what to do (well if she wouldn´t have let anyone allowed to do) or to tell her what´s wrong or what´s right. She could build her own opinion which she couldn´t really do while being in China. At the End of her studies in Scotland and England she had to decide whether she wants to go back to China or not. This Decision was easier for her as the techniques improved in the 1990s and made travelling easier. So she could visit her child and the rest of her family now on a regular basis.
The book itself shows the reader how Pearl struggled with life, love, death, men, the influences of family, friends, culture and politics as well as financial struggles.
For me it was a well written book. Much Details. It was nice to read what Pearl had been through and how she dealt with the situations, which doesn´t necessarily mean that everything she did was a good decision. But it shows a human being who´s probably perfect in her studies but in real life she isn´t (like every other person).
Now after I read The Same Moon I would describe the book as a mixture of Biography, Diary, Travel guide and History (Culture and Politics).
The reason why I don´t rate this book higher is that there are so many different characters in there of which some maybe weren´t that important to mention. I also had wished to have seen Pearl more emotional. Every time when I thought that she finally got emotional the scene changed and that´s why she sometimes seemed a bit cold-hearted to me. And that´s also a point- The scenes change so often. In the first half of the book it was ok but in the second half it changed so much- like scene here, scene there, scene here, and so on. So by and large I would say this book is a nice one and I definitely want to read how Pearls life goes on, if she finally finds true Love, how/if she changes and how the relationship to her daughter keeps going.