Bi FeiyuThree Sisters

Was bitterly disappointed by this book. Extremely dull characters who never engaged the reader. Their stories were tiresome, lifeless. I am sure that no one would have been particularly interested in their fates. And really on top of all that nothing really does happen to the sisters that they can't handle. I think that this novel should have won an award must say a lot about the validity of the Asian branch of the Man organisation.

Interesting snippets of social history and the place of women in a society but rather rambling , introspective stories. The coarse language used may be factual but it does not add to the story. Not reading for pleasure .

An interesting approach to describing life in China during the Cultural Revolution by presenting it through the eyes of three sisters - the third one was the weakest and least satisfactory from my point of view

An interesting story about some Chinese girls told in a traditional manner. Enlightening journey regarding the culture and customs of family life.

How scary life is for some people. So many rules and regulations, is it right should it all stop. Harsh world.

Not an all time favourite book, but had some really interesting chapters. The three sisters do not relate, so anyone coming from a family of three sisters, will be disappointed. I have to admit, I lost interest towards the end and gave up reading it.

No issues at all. Everything as described

How women suffer in some cultures. Terrible treatment and struggles. China is still a primitive country especially in rural areas.

È uno spaccato in tre storie collegate tra loro, in modo più o meno stretto, che si svolgo a dieci anni di distanza, in una realtà storica che, in quei dieci anni, è cambiata notevolmente. Dal punto di vista romantico mi ha colpito molto il secondo racconto e mi ha attratto e coinvolto nella lettura. Il terzo racconto è molto enigmatico dal mio punto di vista. Lascia, positivamente, tanti spunti di riflessione, ma anche tante domande senza risposta.Lo consiglierei agli amanti della cultura cinese, alle inguaribili romantiche per vedere come una madre, un padre e tre sorelle di due generazioni diverse, per cui tre generazioni a confronto, abbiano vissuto l'amore.

Not worth the read. Please select any other book . Sheer waste of time reading this book. Translations are sub par

Couldn't not read because it was not in English

Boring, morose, and self pitying, this is the kind of fiction that earns man booker derived awards.Oprah book club admirers will love this, but I thought it stank: no plot, no depth of character development, no writing worth admiring.Best part of the book is that it is a wonderful campaign against both imperialism and statism. Next time you want to bash liberty and justice for all, read this.

A very adult rated book that explores human lust, sexual awareness blooming in young adults, the intricacy of the Chinese culture of your standing in society marred by the stance of the Chinese revolution under Chairman Mao. Although the exact period is not spelt out in the novel, but you get a sense the people's revolution has been in place for a while, late 70's to early 80's, where the story follows one family, the Wang family, and the story really explores in depth the three of seven daughters: Yumi: the eldest, the one who had the responsibility of looking after the family and siblings and how her quick mind maneuvered to ensure the family's face is saved in on so many occasions because of her father's wondering eyes and her third sister who shared the same `wild' genes; Yuxiu: the third daughter who is her father's favorite daughter has to deal with the humiliation of an event that is considered a big no-no for Chinese girls, and then having to show humiliation when she escapes to live with Yumi, who has resurrected her life as a married woman to a senior general. Then you have the seventh daughter (7 girls and the 8th was the boy), Yuying: who managed to be blessed to have none of the responsibilities of her older sisters and was able to attend an elite school for budding teachers. Her tale follows her through the communist part approach to loyalty to the party, the need to sneak on each other that lead to the discovery of a relationship between student and teacher!I am not sure whether it was the intention of the author to depict how women are treated in Chinese society as third class citizens or whether it reflects his unconscious thought due to his own up bringing? The treatment of women certainly comes across as being quite harsh, but descriptive to be interesting to read about their struggles and how they view themselves in a male dominated society and the importance of a male child to carry on the family name. this novel is not so dated in that it is that far removed from what is still happening in today's society. An interesting read.

The three sisters in this book show the emotions of Chinese women in the l970's. The first sister, who is more or less the mother of the family, is grounded in her world of caregiver to her younger siblings. Her philandering father has used his position to have affairs with many of the town's women. When he makes the mistake of having an affair with the wife of a respected soldier, he loses his position and first daughter must try to regain the family's honor. She does so by marrying an older official and is into a loveless marriage.Second daughter, beautiful and flirtatious, uses her beauty to advance herself in the world, only to come up short. She ends up unmarried and a mother. It seems appropriate for her to come to this end. She has manipulated her way into this condition and bears the fruit of her ways.Third sister's story seems disjointed from the other two. I don't understand where she ends up. The characters around her seem to dominate this chapter. We know more about the teachers than her. The author must have had something in mind but we never know what it is. I enjoyed the book until this last part. I was left with a feeling of disappointment that he didn't give us a true ending.

At first, this story of a large family in china, told in the form of three "novellas," each told from the perspective of three sisters drew me in. However, while the stories of the first two sisters was compelling, the story of the last sister was very dull.First part: This tells the story of the eldest, responsible sister. The father was a respected member of the community who falls from grace. Due to her father's scandal, the older sister finds herself trapped in a marriage to a much older man in order to repair the family's honor.Second part: This tells the story of the second daughter who is beautiful and cruel. She is almost a stereotype of a beautiful girl and ends up receiving her "dues" and finding herself disgraced.Third part" This tells the story of a younger sister in school. Unlike the more interesting stories of the older sisters, this part of the story never drew me in.All in all, this was an ok read, but not great.

We are given three stories about three of the seven Wang sisters. The first two stories about sisters Yumi and Yuxiu are heavily linked. Sister Yuyang's story, though, is virtually a stand alone; out of sync with the other two.The combination is about the daily lives in the rural China of the latter part of the last century. The rules of the state, the backstabbing, the corruption are all laid open - and that's the family life. The public life is even more regimented and filled with shady dealings.Nicely translated and well written, this is a book for those interested in the thinking and actions of the regular people of China of thirty years ago. This is a character study; there is little plot as we normally think of one - which is quite normal in Chinese fiction.I wonder if this started as a much larger book containing stories about all seven daughters and one son of the Wand family. If so, it might explain the bump in the road we feel when going from story two to three.Though perhaps not for most readers, I found this enjoyable.

This book tells the stories of three sisters in a Chinese family of seven sisters and one brother. The story of Yumi, the eldest sister was great. She was such an interesting character who took a stand against her father's philandering. This section of the book brought in the family dynamics and really showed how the village worked which was hilarious. That section gets 5 stars. The second section was about the third sister, Yuxio, who after being gang raped, wants to escape the gossip of the village. This portion was not quite as complelling but still enjoyable and the family connection continued. Four stars for that one.The last section about the sister who went to teachers' school was like a completely different book. The family and other sisters was not referenced at all, but the part that bothered me most was that the book just stopped. By that I mean, it didn't 'end' it just stopped. I looked for the next page, the next paragraph but that was it. Totally abrupt. No tie in to the rest of the book. No hint of a wrap up. Like the author got interrupted in his writing and never came back.I was also a little confused how or why he picked these three sisters out of the seven to choose from and what about the brother. It didn't make sense to me that the other siblings were barely mentioned. Were these three sisters more interesting than the rest? Why even have the other sisters if you're just going to ignore them--just make the family have three sisters.In conclusion, I enjoyed the writing in the book and the individiual stories . . . I just didn't think they were put together right for a book. Either take out the third section or tie it in to the rest . . . and give us stories of all the siblings. But the main reason I gave this three stars was because of the infuriating ending . . . or I just say the infuriating lack of an ending.

Three Sisters has been compared to such books as Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, Memoirs of a Geisha, and Empire of the Sun. While I enjoyed reading the other three novels, this novel was ultimately, very disappointing and boring. I couldn't wait to finish it just to be done with it. This novel centers around the Wang Liafang, a Party Secretary in a tiny village in China and three out of his seven daughters borne by his wife, Shi Guifang-"During the twenty years she was married to Wang Liafang she had presented him with seven girls, not counting three miscarriages." Their eight child is finally a son, a day that Wang Liafang has been eagerly anticipating for over twenty years. Unfortunately, the most amusing part of the book was when you read about all of Wang's extra-marital affairs. He basically sleeps with half of the women in town, while his poor wife is knocked up trying desperately to bear him a son. Everyone basically turns a blind eye to his actions until one day, when he gets caught sleeping with a soldier's wife. He is relieved of his duties as a Party Secretary (they decided that he crossed the line with sleeping with a soldier's wife while he was away at war, fighting for his country). The book then focuses on three of his daughters and how their life transpired after his "big" transgression: Yumi, his eldest daughter, Yuziu, the beautiful but stubborn third daughter (and natural enemy of Yumi), and Yuyan, the seventh daughter. The main problem with this novel is that there is no "heroine", no one you really want to root for. You sort of feel bad for Yumi, as she loses her first true love, but her conniving ways make you not like her. Same flaw with Yuziu. And worst of all, Yuyan's story is so boring you wonder why she was even selected. I do think the author is trying to relay several messages about love, sex, and how status/power effects the first two topics but I think it would have been more effective to tell ONE tale about the entire family versus isolating the tale of three sisters.

Bi Feiyu has the eye of a filmmaker -not surprising given his long involvement in entertainment - and it shows in this novel of three sisters living in one rural Chinese family in the early days of Mao's revolution. Feiyu's writing is lyrical and crisp, delineating with an unwavering eye the dynamics of old traditions butting up against the new order in the lives of one Chinese family. The novel is divided into 3 parts, each limning a portrait of one sister in the line up of 7 girls, plus one lone boy. The novel is set in 1971 and tells the story of Wang Lianfang, a party worker who squanders his small degree of power when outrageous womanizing lands him in the bed of a respected soldier's wife, and he is stripped of his rank. His family must figure out ways to survive in an increasingly hierarchical Mao ordered world, and the story of eldest daughter Yumi unfolds. From Yumi's story of love lost and family honor regained, the story of the second daughter, Yuxiu springs. Unlike her composed elder sister, Yuxiu is a "fox spirit" and flirt who learns to manipulate everyone and thing in her environment, until she becomes pregnant out of wedlock. A decade later, youngest sister Yuyang is poised to escape a dreary fate when she's accepted by a school in Beijing, but she, too, has a story that ends just short of heartbreak.Feiyu is particularly successful when he is honing in on the qualities that make each sister being profiled unique -her struggle to find her place in the family, and make her way in a changing world. He is far less successful in weaving together the 3 stories into anything approaching a coherent whole. But the writing is lovely, the sense of place he achieves feels spot on, and Three Sisters is ultimately a journey well worth taking.

Bi Feiyu portrays 1970s and early 1980s rural China through the stories of 3 sisters. The book is divided into 3 sections, each centered on a year in the life of one sibling in a family of 7 sisters and 1 son, whose father is the local party secretary. The first, Yumi, is the oldest daughter who matures quickly having to care for her younger siblings and deal with her father's philandering ways. She also struggles to marry appropriately, but happiness is not a high priority. The second section, Yuxiu, is the story of the 3rd daughter, who is portrayed as a seductress and fox. Yet, her plans for success tend to backfire, leaving her worse off than when she started. The 3rd section, Yuyang, is about the 7th daughter and set 10 years later than the first two. She won a place at a teacher's college, and it is about her efforts to come into her own person. As with so many novels set in communist China, individuals encounter equal measures tragedy, triumph and endurance. The liberal use of Chinese sayings adds to the entertainment in this book. Bi Feiyu has opened a window into women's lives that fascinates and informs simultaneously.

This it hardly satire, witty or enlightening. A tragic tale of Chineese sisters under the Maoist regime, it details casual and criminal abuse, rape, and an ironic narrative of events that could have been a great view of life under communism in rural China. I say could of, because of the flat and callous way the tale is told. The guy that wrote this, Bi Feiyu, must be a monk in seclusion who has never known a mother, sister or wife at best and likely a mysogenist of the highest order in any case. He has no clue at to the female mind and how it works or to the complexities of feminine emotions in any culture. The main characters (female)are flat, unreal and unsympathetic. They are given no positive traits and even a brutal gang rape is accorded nothing more than temporary physical injury. The relationships of these dissimalar sisters to each other and to the other members of their households would have made for a facinating thread to bind the stories together but, again, the whole thing falls flat because there IS no relationship beyond the dry and hateful narrative of the author. Save your money, save your time. This book is best used to wrap fish.

I found the setting and characters interesting, as far as that goes. But it was unclear to me how the three sisters and their stories are connected, and the author fails to tie things up at the end. For that reason this one left a bad taste in my mouth.