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Bend, Not Break: A Life In Two Worlds (2012)

by Ping Fu(Favorite Author)

3.55 of 5 Votes: 3

ISBN

1591845521 (ISBN13: 9781591845522)

languge

English

genre

Memoir & Autobiography

publisher

Portfolio Hardcover

review 1: Like James Frey's Million Little Pieces, this book exudes controversy over what is real and what is not. The author has admitted that some of her statements and descriptions might not be real or accurate, and the publisher has defended the book saying it is a memoir and not an autobiography. The book certainly illustrates the horrors of China's Cultural Revolution from a first person point of view. Ping is courageous; her work ethic is laudable, and she serves as a model for other young women to enter the technology/computer field. However, the book is awkward and jumps from past to present and back again with few transitions. I'm surprised an editor didn't fix this. Too often, it feels as if Ping is standing on a hill beating her chest saying, "look at how great I am," a... morend I found this irritating. A social studies teacher could use this book as a stepping stone to teaching about the Cultural Revolution in China, family dynamics in China, and the immigrant experience. A teacher could also use this book to help students learn how to sift between reality and fantasy in nonfiction writing.
review 2: I knew nothing about this book when I found it on the New Biography bookshelf in my library. Reading it, I found it to be interesting because I knew pretty much nothing about the Cultural Revolution in China that the author describes. Muddled throughout this book, but becoming clearer toward the end, Ping Fu makes a point -- that if you approach life with love, kindness, and understanding, you and the people you work/live with can only benefit. It's a nice message, and I believe Ping Fu would have been much more successful if she had written a much shorter book limited to her experience as a professional in America. What happened to her since she came to the U.S. -- getting her degree, working for a small company, moving to a corporate world, moving again to a research-oriented company, and then finally starting her own start-up -- that was really fascinating, and the "don't call your lawyer, call the colleague in question" message would really resonate in today's working culture in the U.S. I'm kind of bummed that she didn't just write THAT book, because it would have been a good one. Unfortunately, all the stuff about her life in China was very stiffly described, without any real feeling or emotion attached to it. It just wasn't very well written. There was great potential for a gut-wrenching story, but it just wasn't there. Whether it's true or not, it's not a well-written story, period.Really wish she'd written the "being nice in business" book. Could've been a good one. less

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