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One in a Billion: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey through Modern-Day China
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About One In A Billion: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey
Review Combining lucid, concise descriptions of China’s history with intimate details of peasant commune life culled from a decade’s worth of interviews with An Wei, Pine presents an eye-opening portrait of how ordinary Chinese people can become driving forces for reform. Readers seeking to go beyond the headlines about China will learn much from this account. ― Publishers Weekly Generalizations about China and its struggle for meaningful reform can be corrected with this work about the life of one man. An Wei has witnessed the most traumatic and important events of twentieth-century China and has become a visionary fighter for grassroots democracy at the village level. Nancy Pine’s excellent book enables us to delve into the inner world of this modest yet effective survivor-reformer. After four decades of writing and teaching about China, I would recommend Pine’s scrupulous research and vivid focus on An Wei to anyone interested in understanding the jagged landscape of change in China today. -- Vera Schwarcz, Wesleyan University; author of Colors of Veracity: A Quest for Truth in China, and Beyond An invaluable read for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of modern China and the benefits and burdens endured by its people. Nancy Pine masterfully reveals the personal aspirations of one man who struggled to establish grassroots democracy in the countryside, stood up for truth within the provincial bureaucracy, and built substantial bridges for US-China relations. His is a compelling life story about the crucial issues facing China today. -- Sharon Crain, Shaanxi Teachers University Nancy Pine tells a delightfully readable and inspiring story about China through the life of An Wei. Readers will be fascinated by how he overcame setbacks, pursued education, and persevered through tumultuous governmental changes to become an interpreter for presidents and creator of democracy in his village. I look forward to encouraging all my contacts to read this book. -- Greta Nagel, Museum of Teaching and Learning More than just another account of an individual involved in US-China relations, this fascinating account tells the story of a man who is an exemplar of global citizenship and whose actions have shown the younger generation on both sides of the globe how to interact in selfless ways that benefit others. -- Kelly Long, Colorado State University This one book could change your opinion about what you think of China, its government, and its people. -- Debra Foster, niece of Helen Snow China matters. But how can American readers possibly grasp the complexities of that world power whose fate and ours are inextricably bound? The best way may be to read Nancy Pine's superb biography of one extraordinary man whose odyssey through modern China is the closest we can come to a complete explanation of what makes China tick. -- Eric Maisel, author of Coaching the Artist Within An Wei's personal history is interwoven with China's history as it grew from dynasty to chaos to unified country. Nancy Pine’s book makes the ‘image’ of China more than a superficial Communist behemoth—it gives an insider's perspective to the experiences of people who lived there throughout these transitions and who live there now. -- Elizabeth Tatum, social justice activist An Wei's story of courage and dedication deserves to be better known in both China and the United States. -- Robert Farnsworth, author of From Vagabond to Journalist: Edgar Snow in Asia, 1928–1941 Like Edgar Snow in Red Star Over China in the 1930s, Nancy Pine has discovered a largely unknown Chinese figure in a remote village who encapsulates much of the extraordinary story of modern China. Snow found Mao Zedong. Now Pine gives us An Wei, a bright, ambitious child born to a peasant family in the same region. He and his family suffer through the traditional plagues of old China, drought and locusts among them. Then they must endure the new hardships inflicted by Mao, the grandiose building of c
