I’ve been hearing nothing but wonderful things about this book by Lisa See for years. It’s been on my to-read list, probably since college. I finally got around to reading it, thanks to a Little Free Library in my neighborhood that happened to have a copy.
Before this I had only read one of See’s books, Shanghai Girls, which I thought was only OK. Nevertheless, I had high expectations for this one due to all the aforementioned OMGs everyone had given it.
It was pretty great. The story is about two sworn sisters in China in the mid-nineteenth century. It’s common for girls to form a group of friends known as sworn sisters before they marry, then another group of sworn sisters after they marry, and then a third group of sworn sisters should they make it to widowhood.
But Lily, the main character, has been chosen for something special. She has been chosen to become a laotong to another girl in a nearby village, named Snow Flower. Unlike sworn sisters, Lily and Snow Flower will be bound for life and they will have no other sworn sisters. The arrangement is set up by a matchmaker who stresses this bond is even more sacred than that between man and wife. The two girls are exactly the same age (they were born on the same day), and they’re feet look similar. This being the time and place it is, feet size is very important.
Lily is writing as an old woman, but she starts the story when she’s about six, right before she has to have her feet bound. It’s a terribly painful process, but the alternative is to become a “little daughter-in-law”, which means you get adopted by another family to work your butt off as their slave. You don’t have the status of wife and any man in the household can do “bed business” with you. The girls are terrified of the process of having their feet bound, but they’re even more frightened of the prospect of becoming a “little daughter-in-law”.
What I had not considered was the risk associated with foot binding. One character states that ten percent of all girls who have their feet bound die as a result of the process. Lily’s little sister ends up getting an infection and dying. Have I mentioned how supremely grateful I am not to have been born in China when this was a thing?
Anyway, Lily and Snow Flower first start communicating with each other via a secret language known as nu shu, which is a language used only by women to communicate with other women. Snow Flower writes her first message to Lily on a fan. They then use the fan to record their most important moments in their life together – hence the title.
They grow up best friends, even as their fortunes diverge, but then Lily misinterprets a message from Snow Flower. She thinks Snow Flower has abandoned her in favor of other sworn sisters, when all she has really done is formed friendships with three women who happen to be sworn sisters with each other. Lily forgot the first rule of nu shu: context is everything. Because the language is spelled out phonetically, you have to pay special attention to context. Instead, Lily jumped to a conclusion and the price she paid was her relationship with her best friend.
They sort of make up as Snow Flower is dying, but Lily only realizes the full extent of her mistake after Snow Flower is already gone. She realizes Snow Flower apologized to her, but she never apologized to Snow Flower. In a culture that thrives on honor and guilt, Lily spends the rest of her life trying to make it up to Snow Flower through her children.
It’s all perfectly displayed in the book. Because we only get to see the story from Lily’s perspective, we get to understand her hurt and anger, as well as her remorse. It’s a beautiful story of the love between two women and I enjoyed it immensely!
What about you guys? What did you read this week? Anything that tugged at the heartstrings?
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