Amy Tan

Con el fin de evitar que sus recuerdos se pierdan para siempre, la anciana LuLing, emigrada a Estados Unidos, escribe el relato de su pasado en China. Un día, su hija Ruth encuentra esos documentos en el apartamento y, a traves de ellos, llega a conocer los primeros años de vida de su madre, y algunas revelaciones sobre el pasado familiar. Las dos generaciones de mujeres, con voces alternas, hallaran en este repaso a la memoria un punto de encuentro y reconciliacion.Con La hija del curandero, la novela que sigue a El Club de la Buena Estrella, Amy Tan se consolido como una de las escritoras que mejor ha sabido retratar la relacion entre madres e hijas, y que mejor ha plasmado la confluencia de Oriente con Occidente.

Un viaje de oriente a occidenteEn 1949, cuatro mujeres chinas que recientemente han emigrado a San Francisco inician una serie de reuniones durante las que comen dim sum, juegan al mah-jong y hablan. Unidas por lo que comparten, la perdida y la esperanza, se hacen llamar El Club de la Buena Estrella. Con grandes dosis de ingenio y de sensibilidad, Amy Tan explora la conexion a veces dolorosa y a veces tierna, pero siempre profunda, entre las protagonistas y sus hijas ya nacidas en Estados Unidos, un mundo tan distinto al suyo. A medida que cada una de ellas nos va revelando sus secretos y nos van mostrando la verdad sobre sus vidas, los hilos se van entrelazando de una manera casi magica.

"THE WISEST AND MOST CAPTIVATING NOVEL TAN HAS WRITTEN."The Boston Sunday Globe "TRULY MAGICAL . . . UNFORGETTABLE . . . The first-person narrator is Olivia Laguni, and her unrelenting nemesis from childhood on is her half-sister, Kwan Li. . . . It is Kwan''s haunting predictions, her implementation of the secret senses, and her linking of the present with the past that cause this novel to shimmer with meaningand to leave it in the readers mind when the book has long been finished." The San Diego Tribune "HER MOST POLISHED WORK . . . Tan is a wonderful storyteller, and the story''s many strandsOlivia''s childhood, her courtship and marriage, Kwan''s ghost stories and village talespropel the work to its climactic but bittersweet end." USA Today "TAN HAS ONCE MORE PRODUCED A NOVEL WONDERFULLY LIKE A HOLOGRAM: turn it this way and find Chinese-Americans shopping and arguing in San Francisco; turn it that way and the Chinese of Changmian village in 1864 are fleeing into the hills to hide from the rampaging Manchus. . . . THE HUNDRED SECRET SENSES doesn''t simply return to a world but burrows more deeply into it, following new trails to fresh revelations.

A pious man explained to his followers: "It is evil to take lives and noble to save them. Each day I pledge to save a hundred lives. I drop my net in the lake and scoop out a hundred fishes. I place the fishes on the bank, where they flop and twirl. ''Don''t be scared,'' I tell those fishes. ''I am saving you from drowning.'' Soon enough, the fishes grow calm and lie still. Yet, sad to say, I am always too late. The fishes expire. And because it is evil to waste anything, I take those dead fishes to market and I sell them for a good price. With the money I receive, I buy more nets so I can save more fishes." - Anonymous Twelve American tourists join an art expedition that begins in the Himalayan foothills of China - dubbed the true Shangri-La - and heads south into the jungles of Burma. But after the mysterious death of their tour leader, the carefully laid plans fall apart, and disharmony breaks out among the pleasure-seekers as they come to discover that the Burma Road is paved with less-than-honorable intentions, questionable food, and tribal curses. And then, on Christmas morning, eleven of the travelers boat across a misty lake for a sunrise cruise - and disappear. Drawing from the current political reality in Burma and woven with pure confabulation, Amy Tan''s picaresque novel poses the question: How can we discern what is real and what is fiction, in everything we see? How do we know what to believe?

"Si puo continuare a essere vivi anche da morti? Evidentemente si, dato che questo e successo a lei. Bibi Chen, un''antiquaria di origini cinesi, e morta a San Francisco in circostanze misteriose. Bibi ricorda tutto, ma non il proprio decesso, sul quale indaga la polizia. Bibi vede tutto, compreso il proprio funerale e gli amici affranti, fra cui i dodici che avrebbe dovuto guidare in un viaggio culturale in Cina e Birmania da lei stessa organizzato. Bibi sente tutto, a tratti anche i pensieri altrui. Sono ""i doni del Buddha"", quasi una compensazione della fisicita perduta. I dodici amici decidono di partire ugualmente e Bibi li accompagna, aleggiando sui loro passi, a loro insaputa, proteggendoli come puo. Costretti a lasciare la Cina prima del previsto per i guai provocati dalla loro ignoranza di turisti occidentali privi di una guida adeguata, arrivano in Birmania e, la mattina di Natale, si verifica un altro evento strano e inquietante: undici dei dodici viaggiatori s''imbarcano per una gita sul Lago Inle e spariscono. Mescolando con abile ironia la dimensione metafisica di un io narrante post-mortem al realismo quanto mai attuale del sequestro dei turisti, alle storie personali dei protagonisti - il playboy onesto, l''ingenua attivista dei diritti umani, l''ipocondriaca ecc. - Amy Tan tesse un romanzo che, sotto l''apparente bonomia, non risparmia nessuno: ne l''autoritarismo dei regimi illiberali ne l''individualismo narcisistico del nostro mondo. "

Stunning reissue of an international bestseller, from the author of The Joy Luck Club and The Bonesetter's DaughterOlivia Yee is only five years old when Kwan, her older sister from China, comes to live with the family and turns her life upside down, bombarding her day and night with ghostly stories of strange ancestors from the world of Yin. Olivia just wants to lead a normal American life. For the next thirty years, Olivia endures visits from Kwan and her ghosts, who appear in the living world to offer advice on everything from restaurants to Olivia's failed marriage. But just when she ...

" Tan is one of the prime storytellers writing fiction today." NEWSWEEK Winnie and Helen have kept each other''s worst secrets for more than fifty years. Now, because she believes she is dying, Helen wants to expose everything. And Winnie angrily determines that she must be the one to tell her daughter, Pearl, about the past--including the terible truth even Helen does not know. And so begins Winnie''s story of her life on a small island outside Shanghai in the 1920s, and other places in China during World War II, and traces the happy and desperate events tha led to Winnie''s coming to America in 1949. " The kind of novel that can be read and reread with enormous pleasure." CHICAGO TRIBUNE

Shanghai, 1905. Violet Minturn is the young daughter of the American mistress of the city''s most exclusive courtesan house. But when revolution arrives in the city, she is separated from her mother in a cruel act of chicanery and forced to become a "virgin courtesan." Half-Chinese and half-American, Violet moves effortlessly between the cultural worlds of East and West, quickly becoming a shrewd businesswoman who deals in seduction and illusion. But her successes belie her private struggle to understand who she really is and her search for a home in the world. Lucia, Violet''s mother, nurses wounds of her own, first sustained when, as a teenager, she fell blindly in love with a Chinese painter and followed him from San Francisco to Shanghai, only to be confronted with the shocking reality of the vast cultural differences between them. Violet''s need for answers will propel both her and her mother on separate quests of discovery: journeys to make sense of their lives, of the men-fathers, lovers, sons- who have shaped them, and of the ways we fail one another and our children despite our best attempts to love and be loved.Spanning fifty years and two continents, THE VALLEY OF AMAZEMENT resurrects lost worlds: from the moment when China''s imperial dynasty collapsed, a Republic arose, and foreign trade became the lifeblood of Shanghai, to the inner workings of courtesan houses and the lives of the foreign "Shanghailanders" living in the International Settlement, both erased by World War II. It is also a deeply evocative narrative of family secrets, the legacy of trauma, and the profound connections between mothers and daughters, which returns readers to the compelling territory Amy Tan so expertly mapped in THE JOY LUCK CLUB. With her characteristic wisdom, grace, and humor, she conjures a story of the inheritance of love, its mysteries and senses, and its illusions and truths.

From A to Z, the Penguin Drop Caps series collects 26 unique hardcovers--featuring cover art by Jessica Hische It all begins with a letter. Fall in love with Penguin Drop Caps, a new series of twenty-six collectible and hardcover editions, each with a type cover showcasing a gorgeously illustrated letter of the alphabet. In a design collaboration between Jessica Hische and Penguin Art Director Paul Buckley, the series features unique cover art by Hische, a superstar in the world of type design and illustration, whose work has appeared everywhere from Tiffany & Co. to Wes Anderson's recent film "Moonrise Kingdom" to Penguin's own bestsellers "Committed "and "Rules of Civility." With exclusive designs that have never before appeared on Hische's hugely popular Daily Drop Cap blog, the Penguin Drop Caps series debuted with an 'A' for Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice," a 'B' for Charlotte Bronte's "Jane Eyre," and a 'C' for Willa Cather's "My Antonia." It continues with more perennial classics, perfect to give as elegant gifts or to showcase on your own shelves. T is for Tan. In 1949 four Chinese women, recent immigrants to San Francisco, begin meeting to eat dim sum, play mahjong, and talk. United in shared unspeakable loss and hope, they call themselves the Joy Luck Club. With wit and sensitivity, Amy Tan examines the sometimes painful, often tender, and always deep connection between these four women and their American-born daughters. As each woman reveals her secrets, trying to unravel the truth about her life, the strings become more tangled, more entwined.

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER The new novel from the internationally bestselling author of 'The Joy Luck Club'. In fin de siecle Shanghai, Violet Minturn grows up at Hidden Jade Path, the city's most exclusive courtesan house. But when revolution comes, she is separated from her mother and forced to become a "virgin courtesan." Both Chinese and American, Violet moves between these cultural worlds, becoming a shrewd businesswoman who deals in seduction and illusion. But her successes belie her private turmoil. Violet's need for answers propels her on a quest of discovery: a journey to make sense of her life, to right the wrongs of the past - to find love requited. Spanning fifty years and two continents, 'The Valley of Amazement' dramatises the collapse of China's imperial dynasty and the secret life of the courtesan house. Unfolding old family secrets, this novel returns readers to the compelling territory of 'The Joy Luck Club'. With her characteristic wisdom, grace and humour, she conjures a story of the inheritance of love, its mysteries and betrayals, and its illusions and truths.

A new novel from the internationally bestselling author of 'The Joy Luck Club'. In turn-of-the-century Shanghai, Violet Minturn is raised by her American mother, the mistress of the city's most renowned courtesan house. When the revolution comes, a cruel deception forces Violet to become a virgin courtesan. 'The Valley of Amazement' is the story of three women, bound by blood and betrayal. But, as she struggles to understand her heritage, it is Violet's determination to forge her own destiny that propels this bittersweet tale of family secrets, changing identities and lost love.

An expansive, heartbreaking novel from the internationally bestselling author of 'The Joy Luck Club'. In turn-of-the-century Shanghai, Violet Minturn is raised by her American mother, the mistress of the city's most renowned courtesan house. When the revolution comes, a cruel deception forces Violet to become a virgin courtesan. 'The Valley of Amazement' is the story of three women, bound by blood and betrayal. But, as she struggles to understand her heritage, it is Violet's determination to forge her own destiny that propels this bittersweet tale of family secrets, changing identities and lost love.