10/10
The Last Boat Out of ShangHai
is a remarkable book written by Helen Zia. Zia interviewed over a hundred people who escpaed ShangHai
before the Communist invasion and of the hundreds of stories she heard, she selected four people to focus on in the book. The book maps the lives of four people
before, during, and after the Communist take over in parallel to each other. Each person's experience is different from the other which makes the book so well written and exceptional as
Zia provides readers with a comprehensive view of life in ShangHai at the time. For example Benny's family lived lavishly during the war with Japan because of his father's relationships with the Japanese. However, the same relationship that
allowed Benny's family to throw dinner parties as the rest of the city suffered from malnutrition was the demise of Benny's family and future. When the Communists began plotting to overthrow the country, Benny and his family were punished
for their relationship with Japan. His father was arrested, his mom ran off, and Benny and his siblings were separated.
On the other hand, there was Ho who, unlike Benny, lived in scarcity his whole life. Four significant themes that emerged from the stories were abandonment, perseverance,
family, and hopelessness. These stories and their themes took me on an emotional roller coaster ride, yet made my reading experience unique and immersive. It is impossible to fathom the struggles and pain every family had to go through during this time period.
After reading the book, I gave it to my grandfather who was 17 at the time he left for Taiwan, 15 hours before the Communist take over in ShangHai. He told me his father had taken him out of school
and told him to pack quickly and that a friend of his who was a pilot was going to help them escape the city. With no tickets, they managed to convince workers on the plane that they also worked on the plane to gain access to the cockpit.
There was little room in the cockpit and my grandpa, my great grandfather, and others took turns sitting in the one available seat. Hearing my grandpa speak of his experiences during this time, made me think
how amazing it must have been for Helen Zia to listen to so many experiences of history. However, I assume it must have also been equally as heartbreaking as well.
Overall, this was an engaging book that taught me a lot about history in a very digestable way.
9/10
During my trip to Nepal in 2022, I read Elizabeth Enslin's memoir to better understand Nepali culture and ways of life.
Enslin wrote a capitivating memoir that details her career, life, and family journey as she follows her husband to Nepal. Similar to The Last Boat out of ShangHai
, I really enjoyed
learning about Nepali culture and history through the form of a memoir rather than digest information through a textbook style format. Enslin is not only a gifted writer,
but also a truly impressive and dedicated anthropologist. Coming from Seattle, she moves to a small village in Nepal and immerses herself in the culture while noting challenges she faces. While she struggles
with learning Nepali she states that she first started to relearn English to make it easier to learn Nepali. I though this was an interesting thought and if I ever try to pick up
Chinese again, I will keep this in mind.
Part of the reason I also enjoyed the memoir was because Enslin teaches readers how anthropoligists conduct research and what certain interactions or patterns she observes to understand and analyze culture.
The memoir taught me a lot about the career of an anthropoligist and the culture of Nepal in an entertaining and authentic way.
10/10
The best kind of books are the ones that make you crave more as you reach the last page. As I read "Tuesdays with Morrie",
I would reread chapters and sentences just to delay finishing the book. Mitch Albom writes about his relationship with is college professor, Morrie, and
the last class and lesson he learns from him as his professor falls ill to ALS. Morrie was a kind-hearted, compassionate, full of life person who I wish I could
have met in my life time. I have to thank Mitch Albom for writing this novel and allowing me and an infinitie amount of readers the opportunity to absorb Morrie's wisdom.
This book is one that everyone should read. Readers glean a unique perspective of life from a dying yet optimisitc and joyful man who teaches us about what the meaning of life truly is
and how one even if someone is breathing, they are not always living. One of my favorite parts of the book is Morrie's unique perspective on age. He says that those who wish to go back in time have not found meaning in life yet because
if you have found meaning, why would you want to go back to a time where you didn't? Morrie does not want us to fear growing older, he wants us to embrace it fiercely because when you accept time, you start living in the present.
Morries urges us to ignore the culture of society. Just because it's an embedded norm, does not mean we have to follow it. He urges us to create our own culture in which we dictate our destiny and happiness. Morrie's words and wisdom is not new to me or to other readers, however,
his ability to speak so highly of life when life only threw him tragedies, truly makes his words and character inspirational.
I could tell how much of an impact Morrie's words and ideas had on Mitch as he went on and wrote a second book "The Five People You Meet in Heaven" that emphasizes the greatest lessons he was taught by Morrie.
I loved this book and my entire experience reading it. So far I have not read a book written by Mitch Albom that has not left me in tears.
8.5/10
CJ Hauser's "The Crane Wife" is the first memoir I have read on my own outside of school. When I first started it, I began to wonder to myself, “Why do I care about her life?”. I never knew her (even though she was a professor at Colgate, I did not take any of her classes) and she is not a celebrity.
However, once I started, I could not stop myself from reading because of her complete candidness, vulnerability, and dry humor. Her memoir is a reflection of her life and how Hauser lived by the rules and expectations of others such as starting a family when you are married and having kids before 30.
The life she was desperately trying to obtain to satisfy the expectations of others caused her heartbreak, dread, and confusion. After reflecting on her past, she creates her own definition of what true love and a happy life is despite what society expects from her. I loved reading about her journey and
admire how she is willing to deviate from the conventional norms of marriage to find her true happiness. She provides comfort to her readers that it is okay to follow your own heart instead of the path already taken. That it is okay to not abide by the rules of society. Hauser does a great job of showing
readers an unlimited number of paths a person could take in life, making us feel in control of our lives (when sometimes it's easy to forget that we are). Her memoir encouraged me to reflect upon my own experiences and in what ways my life has been shaped by societal norms. Her book also made me think about
writing a memoir and what kind of message I would want to send to readers and what emotions I would want them to feel. A book that makes a reader both reflect on their lives and their own writing is truly a success in my eyes.
10/10
"The Outsiders", by William Thorndike, is an exceptional book profiling eight unconventional, yet successful, CEOs. Thorndike does an excellent job at engaging with readers by telling a story rather than spewing facts about how these CEOs attained their success. His research and analysis on the eight CEOs is very
thought provoking and I believe anyone in business or wanting to learn more about business should read this book. As a person who is quite new to corporate America, I have learned so many different topics from this book in a digestible way through Thorndike's ability to simplify complex business strategies taught in
intensive MBA programs in just a few chapters. This book is truly a great way to learn about capital allocation and management and I highly recommend it to anyone who is just starting out in business or has even been working in business their whole lives.