Adeline Yen Mah: Falling Leaves
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SuduNona
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Adeline Yen Mah: Falling Leaves
A true story, Adeline’s autobiography clings to you with the tenacity of a disease. Set in China during the civil war, it is a critical damnation of Chinese Communism and at the same time tears you apart in the ragged horror of what Adeline, her siblings and ultimately their father suffered at the psychotic mercy of his manic second wife, Niang.
Adeline, the youngest of five children, was blamed by her family for the death of her mother a week after her birth. Her father, a very wealthy, young and handsome businessman remarried quickly to the seventeen year old Niang who had a French father and Chinese mother. Her first act was to rename all the stepchildren. Overnight Jun-ling became Adeline and was persistently punished as the runt of the family by bullying, humiliation and emotional cruelty.
As you read reel in horror at the way in which Niang quickly ejects family members from favour, controls, manipulates and punishes the children at will, even as adults, disinherits not only one of her own children but Adeline and her siblings as well, you wonder how much more you as reader, let alone Adeline can take. I found the book dangerously compelling and read it in two late night sessions with a duvet wrapped tight around me for comfort - I needed to feel protected.
For this is what Niang did to me. She is twisted, mean, malicious, obsessed with power and has Adeline’s father completely round her little finger. Wherever in the world the children as adults live Niang’s web of viciousness follows. When two of Adeline’s siblings side with Niang, infected by the disease of her mind control, the inevitable battle for the inheritance of what is a huge empire of business interests is hideous in its complexity and veniality. The machinations between brothers and sisters, half siblings and Niang, even beyond the grave, are contagious.
I found it a very hard book to complete, and not because it was badly written, far from it. The emotional and actual abuse of the children and as adults is relentless. You feel compelled to continue reading yet want to put the book away because it is too upsetting.
At the same time you hear about the suffering of ordinary people like Adeline’s family during the rise of Communism in China with its continuous reform movements: against land owners, party members and capitalists all of which were futile and yet followed one after another. The family were forced to attend ‘Struggle Meetings’ to ‘assist in interpreting their past waywardness,’ cowed into to denouncing each other, stripped of everything they owned, subject to roving gangs and beatings and yet somehow survived.
I think this book deserves 4 out of 4 stars for showing the world the reality of life in Communist China, gaining our empathy and sympathy so effortlessly, not sparing the impact of Niang’s destructiveness and helping us absorb it all and finish reading to the end. No mean feat!
Adeline, the youngest of five children, was blamed by her family for the death of her mother a week after her birth. Her father, a very wealthy, young and handsome businessman remarried quickly to the seventeen year old Niang who had a French father and Chinese mother. Her first act was to rename all the stepchildren. Overnight Jun-ling became Adeline and was persistently punished as the runt of the family by bullying, humiliation and emotional cruelty.
As you read reel in horror at the way in which Niang quickly ejects family members from favour, controls, manipulates and punishes the children at will, even as adults, disinherits not only one of her own children but Adeline and her siblings as well, you wonder how much more you as reader, let alone Adeline can take. I found the book dangerously compelling and read it in two late night sessions with a duvet wrapped tight around me for comfort - I needed to feel protected.
For this is what Niang did to me. She is twisted, mean, malicious, obsessed with power and has Adeline’s father completely round her little finger. Wherever in the world the children as adults live Niang’s web of viciousness follows. When two of Adeline’s siblings side with Niang, infected by the disease of her mind control, the inevitable battle for the inheritance of what is a huge empire of business interests is hideous in its complexity and veniality. The machinations between brothers and sisters, half siblings and Niang, even beyond the grave, are contagious.
I found it a very hard book to complete, and not because it was badly written, far from it. The emotional and actual abuse of the children and as adults is relentless. You feel compelled to continue reading yet want to put the book away because it is too upsetting.
At the same time you hear about the suffering of ordinary people like Adeline’s family during the rise of Communism in China with its continuous reform movements: against land owners, party members and capitalists all of which were futile and yet followed one after another. The family were forced to attend ‘Struggle Meetings’ to ‘assist in interpreting their past waywardness,’ cowed into to denouncing each other, stripped of everything they owned, subject to roving gangs and beatings and yet somehow survived.
I think this book deserves 4 out of 4 stars for showing the world the reality of life in Communist China, gaining our empathy and sympathy so effortlessly, not sparing the impact of Niang’s destructiveness and helping us absorb it all and finish reading to the end. No mean feat!
