In Daughters of the Sun and Moon, Lisa See (Lady Tan's Circle of Women) tells her story, set in 1870s Los Angeles, through three women's perspectives, giving readers a multifaceted look into life in Lo Sang (as it's called by the Chinese community). The town's tiny Chinese population was then dominated by rival tongs, fraternal organizations often connected to crime and extortion. Their constant jockeying for power and influence impacts the lives of all three women.
Petal, determined to return home to China, initially spends much of her time plotting to escape her life of indentured servitude at a local brothel. Reluctantly, she forms connections with her fellow sex workers and eventually schemes with Moon to grow plants for the doctor's practice. Although Moon has several advantages--literacy, a loving husband, satisfying work helping in his medical practice--she is always conscious of her doubly precarious position in the community as a Chinese woman. She feels protective of Dove, whose tightly restricted existence, bound "lily feet," and marriage to a much older man leave her vulnerable to the machinations of unscrupulous men. When simmering tensions, racial and otherwise, boil over on the night of October 24, 1871, the three women must band together to help one another survive.
See's narrative brims with historical detail, including the particulars of Chinese festivals and holidays; ingredients and methods used in traditional Chinese medicine; and the complicated racial dynamics present in a city that was home to Mexicans and Indigenous people as well as Chinese immigrants and white settlers. See writes unflinchingly of the racism faced by people of color and the harsh immigration policies that made life more difficult for Chinese people, especially women, to build a life in the post-Civil War U.S. Set against this stark backdrop, the women's friendship--often kept hidden from the men trying to restrict them--blooms beautifully in a harsh environment, like the chrysanthemum tea Petal serves her customers.
Poignant and fascinating, Daughters of the Sun and Moon is a heart-pounding frontier narrative and a tender tribute to female friendship. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams
Shelf Talker: Lisa See's sweeping ninth historical novel follows the intertwined fortunes of three Chinese women caught up in the racial tensions of 1870s Los Angeles.