I first came across Lotus by Lijia Zhang at the Elliot Bay Book Company in Seattle, Washington during winter break. The beautiful cover immediately drew me to the book and after reading the story’s premise, I knew it would become a treasured souvenir. Reading books in the young adult genre has always been my comfort zone. However, I’ve been recently diving into fiction written for adults because they touched upon unfortunate aspects of reality such as abuse, mental illness, and trauma. Lotus stood out to me based on the fact that Zhang had taken these aspects and discussed them in a different setting - China.
Usually, I would read books that take place somewhere in the United States about the lives of fictional characters who thrived in places I was familiar with, such as California or New York. China was a completely different world for me and Zhang’s writing reveals the darker characteristics of a country that boasts economic success. Zhang would coin casual Chinese phrases in character dialogue throughout the book, which added depth to the setting of China.
She also explores the topic of the troubling prostitute industry in China throughout the mid-twentieth century. We see this through the perspective of the main character, Lotus, who is a prostitute herself, and Bing, a photographer whose mission is to reveal the prostitutes’ human side to the public.
Usually, I would read books that take place somewhere in the United States about the lives of fictional characters who thrived in places I was familiar with, such as California or New York. China was a completely different world for me and Zhang’s writing reveals the darker characteristics of a country that boasts economic success. Zhang would coin casual Chinese phrases in character dialogue throughout the book, which added depth to the setting of China.
She also explores the topic of the troubling prostitute industry in China throughout the mid-twentieth century. We see this through the perspective of the main character, Lotus, who is a prostitute herself, and Bing, a photographer whose mission is to reveal the prostitutes’ human side to the public.
Zhang properly utilizes her characters to present problems in China that continue up to this day such as: discrimination against migrant workers, terrible working conditions, and police corruption. Lotus’s life as a prostitute throughout the novel reflects the lives of millions of other women who either chose or were forced to enter the industry for its favorable payments. She also represents the percentage of migrant workers who are discriminated for their rural background in urban workplaces. The author makes use of Lotus as a fictional depiction of the hardships women and poor workers have experienced in China, giving acknowledgement to some of the country’s current circumstances.
Bing, in my opinion, was not a significant perspective in the book. He only seems to serve a temporary role as Lotus’s “hero” in the beginning of the book, when he rescues her from a police raid. There are also other occurrences throughout the book where Bing wanted to be a heroic figure for Lotus because of his ability to use his privilege as a regular citizen to rescue her from the industry. But I didn’t see the point of his presence throughout the novel when Lotus independently grew as a character by herself. By the end of the novel, I was amazed by Lotus’s recognition of her self worth as a woman of low socioeconomic status in China.
I thought that Lotus was a great novel that brought together a variety of problems with substantial background research to make the fictional depiction as realistic as possible. The author also made me sympathize with the side characters, which is a rarity for me, since I tend to primarily focus on the protagonists. Read Lotus if you want to read something emotionally charged, yet filled with realism.
Bing, in my opinion, was not a significant perspective in the book. He only seems to serve a temporary role as Lotus’s “hero” in the beginning of the book, when he rescues her from a police raid. There are also other occurrences throughout the book where Bing wanted to be a heroic figure for Lotus because of his ability to use his privilege as a regular citizen to rescue her from the industry. But I didn’t see the point of his presence throughout the novel when Lotus independently grew as a character by herself. By the end of the novel, I was amazed by Lotus’s recognition of her self worth as a woman of low socioeconomic status in China.
I thought that Lotus was a great novel that brought together a variety of problems with substantial background research to make the fictional depiction as realistic as possible. The author also made me sympathize with the side characters, which is a rarity for me, since I tend to primarily focus on the protagonists. Read Lotus if you want to read something emotionally charged, yet filled with realism.