Snow Flower and the Secret Fan

written by Lisa See

For one reason or another, I've really fallen off in my consumption of fiction these last few months. I hate it when life gets in the way of reading! This was a great novel to dive back in with. It came from my very smart and well-read mother-in-law, who reads all the good books out there.

This book is both amazing and disturbing. It chronicles the lives of two Chinese women living in rural nineteenth-century China, and the horrific struggles they endure simply because they are female. Though the two women, Snow Flower and Lily, are not related, at around age 6 they are matched with each another by their families as laotong. Literally translated, this means "old sames," implying that the girls' past, present and future are so aligned that they are sort of soulmates.

Not all Chinese girls of that era were matched with a laotong, and it seems to be something of a privilege. The seriousness of the match was almost akin to marriage; families had to consent to the pairing of the girls, and there was a legal agreement involved which the girls had to sign (at age six or seven!), pledging to be faithful to this contractual friendship for life. The relationship provided lifelong emotional support for the two women, and it was often also a boon to the families involved: alliances between respected or prosperous clans helped to cement the economic and social stability of both families.

Lily and Snow Flower endure the barbaric ritual of footbinding together (Google it — you'll be appalled), they grow into young women together, and they both eventually "marry out" to men of their families' choosing. Through all the stages of their lives, they share and document their histories in nu shu (a secret writing created by Chinese women) on the fan that they share.

Once the girls reach adulthood and marry, the novel gets pretty turbulent. Through circumstances that neither of them can control, Lily marries into a well-to-do family and Snow Flower marries into a despised family. Their lives diverge and their friendship suffers, though they are still bound together through a handful of shocking and heartbreaking experiences. Both endure amazing hardships, and you're left with the impression that it generally sucks to be a woman in nineteenth-century China — regardless of how well off your family might be. As one of the traditional sayings from the book quips, "Raising a girl and marrying her off is like building a fancy road that others may use." Nice.

This would be a good book for any young woman to read, as it's a jarring reminder of how far women have come, not only in the Chinese culture but in the world in general.