Beijing Welcomes You: Unveiling the Capital City of the Future by Tom Scocca details Slate contributor Scocca's discoveries in China after he followed his wife there while she took an assignment. He arrived in 2004, just in time to watch the preparations for the 2008 Olympic Games, which the Chinese did up big.
China itself is so big that we decided to make this a special double-title edition of Further Reading, meaning that we're giving you twice as many book ideas.
If you are interested in Beijing Welcomes You, and want more:
Fiction about China: Try Lisa See's novels, which include Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (a major motion picture release this summer), Peony in Love and linked novels Shanghai Girls and Dreams of Joy. See is of Chinese descent and combines historical research with a passion for China that makes for unforgettable reading. A completely different view of 20th-century China comes from the perspective of an American missionary couple in Bo Caldwell's City of Tranquil Light, the highly praised author's first novel in more than a decade and a beautifully wrought portrait of a marriage.
Nonfiction about China: Rather than give you expected titles, we've chosen two that could not be more different. The late poet Iris Chang's The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II examines the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Chinese soldiers and civilians by Japanese soldiers after the city fell in 1937. Amy Chua's controversial Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother is about Chua's decision to try traditional Chinese parenting techniques in 21st-century America. Both books will show you some of what makes the Chinese spirit indomitable.
Memoir about China: For a parallel experience to Scocca's, try Deborah Fallows's Dreaming in Chinese: Mandarin Lessons in Life, Love, and Language, a memoir from 2010 about the author's three years learning Mandarin Chinese and using its frustrating and rich connotations and symbols to interpret everyday life. Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution by Ji-Li Jiang is an intense personal look at what happened to innocent people during Mao's “Great Leap Forward,” and shows how a society can fall apart even while its most powerful members are pretending that everything works seamlessly and harmoniously.