Out of Mao's Shadow: The Struggle for the Soul of a New China

This is a truly great book!

This book tells about modern China from a human rights perspective. I may be part Chinese myself, and I love Chinese civilization, but this book and others like it made me realize that China has to change. Apparently its civil society is appallingly cruel, and there don't seem to be any real safeguards for citizens' rights. The book did have a certain tone of advocacy to it that made me think it might be slightly unbalanced. However, even though this book may have a bias, the stories it relates are still powerful. Everyone interested in today's China (which should be all people, given China's influence) should read it.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

China is still Maoist at heart

Even though China's amazing if not miracle economy has made China one of the most perennial visited and powerful countries on earth, this book originally shows its fascination with secrecy and authoritarianism is not over, nor will it ever end totally as Pan concludes the book with various profiles of courageous nonconformists that bucked the system. Even though many of these dreamers try to go around the totalitarian way of life in China, the infamous Chinese security services are always around the corner with corruption and arrests with no compunction. It seems as though all the generic books on China ignore the authoritarian and human side of China, but this book absorbingly goes into high detail about them and China's darker side, while informing us that their are those trying to reform China, but without much redress or help.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

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