Green Island
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  • Published: 15 September 2017
  • ISBN: 9781101872369
  • Imprint: Knopf US
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 400
  • RRP: $32.99
Categories:

Green Island

A Novel

Formats & editions
Audiobook
15 Oct 2024
Paperback
15 Sep 2017
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A stunning story of love, betrayal, and family, set in a Taiwan undergoing enormous changes over the course of the twentieth century.

BEST BOOK AWARD IN FICTION BY THE ASSOCIATION FOR ASIAN AMERICAN STUDIES • A stunning, lyrical novel that tells "the story of how the Tsais, a Taiwanese family, survive the 'February 28 Incident' of 1947 and precariously navigate the decades that follow" (The New York Times).

As an uprising rocks Taiwan, a young doctor in Taipei is taken from his newborn daughter by Chinese Nationalists, on charges of speaking out against the government. Although the doctor eventually returns to his family, his arrival is marked by alienation from his loved ones and paranoia among his community. 

Years later, this troubled past follows his youngest daughter to America, where, as a mother and a wife, she too is forced to decide between what is right and what might save her family—the same choice she witnessed her father make many years before. 

The story of a family and a nation grappling with the nuances of complicity and survival, Green Island raises the question: how far would you go for the ones you love?
  • Published: 15 September 2017
  • ISBN: 9781101872369
  • Imprint: Knopf US
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 400
  • RRP: $32.99
Categories:

About the author

Shawna Yang Ryan

SHAWNA YANG RYAN is a former Fulbright scholar, the author of one previous novel, Water Ghosts, and teaches in the Creative Writing Program at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa. Her short fiction has appeared in ZYZZYVA, The Asian American Literary Review, Kartika Review, and The Berkeley Fiction Review. She lives in Honolulu.

Praise for Green Island

  • "Ryan embraces the complexity of the situation, by not creating heroes but instead exploring the truth of compromise, survival and belonging." --The New York Times
  • "Heartbreaking.... Told in luscious prose, 'Green Island' teaches readers about the humanity of mankind, the brutality of political power and unrest, and why some secrets are never told." --Annie Philbrick, The Boston Globe
  • "An intricate, gracefully told tale that blends war history, suspense and a woman's coming-of-age and beyond.... The pages bloom with description, with a photolike sense of place." --The Seattle Times
  • "Moving and suspenseful." --The Richmond Times-Dispatch
  • "Precise and poetic.... This is a significant work, full of carefully researched detail that results in a moving and indelible story." --Publishers Weekly
  • "Ryan paints a chilling, convincing picture of Taiwan [that] stands as a tribute to the flawed survivors of [its] history." --Los Angeles Times
  • "Gripping: a triumph of sustained focus on unusually thorny material.... But Green Island is much more than a historical novel. It's also a family epic." --The Washington Times
  • "Powerful.... Absorbing and affecting." --Booklist (starred)
  • "The narrative works movingly on many different levels but especially on the personal and the political." --Kirkus Reviews

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