Being a distant cousin of the Chinese emperor does not save young Eastern Jewel from being sent to Japan to live with a relative of her fathers, after she is caught watching him with a servant girl.

In Japan she duels with her adoptive mother and is eventually married of to a Mongolian prince, but not before Japan seeps into her soul. She ends up in Shanghai where she spies on her fellow countrymen for the Japanese as they try to secure a foothold in China.

The Private Papers of Eastern Jewel is based on the real life story of Yoshiko Kawashima and narrated by her, an intriguing character who is hard to like, which left me struggling a bit at the beginning of the book. She is incredibly manipulative and self serving, with scant regard for those she uses to further herself or her aims. However Eastern Jewel is under no illusions about herself, who she is, what she wants out of life and when she sets a goal she holds no qualms about doing whatever it takes to achieve it. She forms few close relationships in the book, with the most interesting being her step mother, Natsuko, who echoes through the book, long after Eastern Jewel has moved on. Most other characters are used to further her aims or for pleasure, as Shanghai allows the darker side of her personality free reign, her only check being the disturbing dreams her conscience sends her throughout her life.

I have questioned if my dislike of Eastern Jewel was from her character, or perhaps because she has a traditionally male role, a self centred sexual philanderer who is driven purely by their ego. I can’t think of another female character like Eastern Jewel in any other book I’ve read. But I don’t think that is the case, had the character been male I would have had the same dislikes, it’s the characteristics that I disliked, more than the character. Indeed I did find Easter Jewel fascinating, I admired her conviction to break out of her pre-destined role and how she bent her life around her will while at the same time acknowledging the dark parts of her own soul. However the will that does not bend will break, and it is Eastern Jewels own determination that leads to her demise, but she and makes few, if any apologies along the way.
(blog review here)

For all those people who enjoyed books like Snow Flower and the Secret Fan and Memoirs of a Geisha... not quite as good as those (I think I gave them both five stars) but definitely a worthwhile read.

I enjoyed spending time with Eastern Jewel, despite her selfishness and short-sightedness. Lindley presents her as a woman utterly determined to shape her own life rather than be owned by the men around her, and she succeeds in her goal, although at a price.

Another reviewer criticized this version of Eastern Jewel as being "too modern" and perhaps that's true, but I don't know enough about pre WWII China and Japan to have an ear for such things. I only know that I appreciated the fact that the author realized Eastern Jewel was wounded and struggling, even if her heroine would never admit to it. What she lacked in self awareness, she overcompensated for in determination and nerve.

Personally, I would have wished for a bit more depth and detail in the book. Many years are covered in a relatively short space, and I often found myself wishing Lindley had lingered a bit more over events. However, it did make for a quick, pleasant read.

I spent most of this book just wanting it to be over so I could read the next one.

This book is given one star, not because it's the monstrosity seen in some of my other one star reviews, but because of the incredible disappointment it is, and because the author very clearly states in her forward what she wanted from this book, and because she failed so utterly at it.

Lindley says in her forward that she came across the story of Eastern Jewel, and felt that the consistent portrayal of her was that of one-dimensional badness, and she wanted to explore how she had gotten where she was, and some of her good points (courage, loyalty.) Despite this, Eastern Jewel is one of the most patently unlikable protagonists I have ever encountered. She never did a single thing that endeared me to her, and her every thought, every action grated on me constantly.

There are several other flaws with the book. Completely pointless things are detailed excessively, such as food, furniture, clothes, descriptions of rooms, and dreams. But where detail would have been helpful...none. For example, when Eastern Jewel moved to Japan, did they speak Chinese with her? Did she already know Japanese? How? Was there a language barrier? The same goes with her Mongolian in-laws. How did she meet her circle in Shanghai? Why would her father be willing to let her be raised in Japan? Late in the book, one character is dropped without mention for nearly SEVENTY PAGES, and then suddenly mentioned again as if this were normal.

The descriptions of dreams and food chapter names did nothing to add layers to the book, and instead only came off as -- and I hate this word and try not to use it -- incredibly pretentious. Like the author was desperately trying to be artistic and just falling flat on her face.

Her fascination with men's clothing is never explained beyond one lame line early on, and never explored later on. Her love and loyalty for Japan is never really explained either, and in fact, all of her descriptions of her early life in Japan would make me, and I suspect many others, in fact feel nothing for contempt for the culture and society if that is what I had lived through. These things are both key to what we know about the real Eastern Jewel, and yet they are so unsatisfyingly discussed in this book, it's unbelievable.

Oh, and the ending is just...I mean, really? Seriously? ARGH!

This book is almost nothing but rough sex, dreams, and descriptions of furniture and food. I'd be willing to bet if you took out everything but those 3, you'd take out maybe....60 pages?

I really want to know who the real Eastern Jewel was now; she can't have been as supremely annoying and one-dimensionally awful as portrayed in this book.

This book follows the journey of former Manchurian princess turned Japanese aristocrat who experienced disturbing life-journey from childhood to adulthood, being used and abused throughout her life. Personally, I find the journey very interesting. However, the writing style bothers me. I don't know about other editions of the book but mine has no spacing so it was really overwhelming. The author is trying to cram in so many details in one page that I easily lost track.
As for the main character, I mostly pity her but I can't relate or root for her. Her upbringing and constant sexual abuse by the patriarchs around her turn her into that person. I do understand and sympathize but I guess I can never make peace with how almost every time she solve her problems by sleeping with someone. I guess that's just how it works back then. I do love the complex relationship with some of the people in her past and the conflicts she had about her identity; being born Chinese but raised as Japanese. She want to be identified as Japanese but her past keeps catching up to her. She has this conflicting frenemy with her supposed adopted mother and father (supposed because the mother refused to acknowledge her and the father sexually abuses her, and she grows to like it, even misses it). I like how the author depicts the psyche of a person who has been living in abuse all her life and conditions that way. But as she grow older, it began to feel icky as she never sees the wrong with the treatment she received.

This book was written as if Eastern Jewel was writing a memoir. At the end, I wondered why I didn't have a feel for who Eastern Jewel was as a person. I didn't know her motivations, her abandonment issues, her attachment to Japan, or disgust for China. After reading a person's journal for 300 pages, I expect to know a little more! Why didn't Eastern Jewel get more upset about being sterilized after the abortion? Wasn't she scared of the abuse of her stepfather and stepgrandfather? She didn't seem to miss her mother or Sorry until the very end.

Lindley wrote this book as historical fiction to give a one-dimensional character some dimension. All I saw in Eastern Jewel was a woman who slept around with everyone. Eastern Jewel was very matter of fact about her entire life, showing emotion precisely twice in the book: falling in love with Yamaga and falling in love with Jack. I only know she was in love because she told me. The entire book was Eastern Jewel telling me things, not showing me.

A poorly written book about a great topic. Clearly Lindley's first novel.

This was a book club selection and, while I enjoyed the reading of it, the more we discussed it, the more I found it lacking.

The Private Papers of Eastern Jewel is based on the real life of a Chinese girl, sold to/adopted by a Japanese family. Initiated into sex by her adopted grandfather, she later becomes involved and obsessed with her adoptive father, and for the rest of her life considers herself to be Japanese. She is married to a Mongolian prince, escapes to Shanghai and from there basically sleeps with every man (and some of the women) she meets, nurturing her opium habit along the way. Because of her ties to China she is selected to become a Japanese spy, but in the end they all deny ties to her and she is executed as a traitor.

The book was good, but it could have been amazing. It was very well written for the most part, and the descriptions of the people, places and eras (mainly the '30s and '40s) were very interesting. Then I read the Wikipedia write-up on Eastern Jewel and discovered that the author essentially took a brief factual sketch of the woman's life and used it as her outline, filling in the blanks with not much aside from sexual exploits. There was virtually no character development or major events depicted beyond what is actually known, which is extremely disappointing in a fictional work. One would expect a much richer story given the gem she had to work with, but it almost seems as though Lindley was afraid to stray too far from the facts.

Oddly enough, the only place where she didn't follow the record was with regard to Eastern Jewel's time as a spy. This portion was dealt with extremely briefly and almost downplayed, when I think it ought to have been the real focus and climax of the story. History says that Eastern Jewel was quite a notorious spy, leading and training militia, but the book paints her simply as an informer, and not a great one at that.

I did enjoy this book and appreciate the fact that it introduced me to a fascinating period in history, but it makes me think that Lindley is a talented writer who simply lacks imagination.

this was a good read. i like historical things, fiction and nonfiction, and i liked this because it wasnt too general like some historical accounts are, and it had a good mixture of suspense and scandal and a good 'personal touch' to it, like you're with the character.