Customer Reviews

China Doll

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I worked in a Chinese orphanage for over four years and can tell you that reading this story put me back in the middle of all the emotions and outrage I dealt with on a daily basis. Many people think that negative stories about orphanages shouldn't be written, that they can't be that bad---but the truth is that some of them are that bad. The more that people open their eyes at what is really happening, the better chance at improving conditions we will have. Awareness is the key.

With China Doll, Talia Carner, late of Puppet Child, is once again advocating for children--this time, on a global stage. Literally. Her heroine Nola, a singer at the peak of her game, is sweeping through major Chinese cities on a goodwill tour with full entourage and spare-no-expense staging, when a shadowy figure thrusts a baby girl into her arms. Nola struggles to keep the child, battling the ghosts of her past and the very real and powerful spectres of her management and global politics.

Like Puppet Child, this book had me thoroughly engrossed, turning pages into the wee hours of the night. Also, like Puppet Child, it opened a door into the institutionalized mistreatment of children--this time, in Chinese "dying rooms," where drugged orphans languish until they are no longer in need of the scant care on offer.

Carner has done her homework here. Her research shapes and enhances the story, but her passion for justice brings it alive. This is accessible but important fiction that highlights both the simple ethics governing the life and death of children, and the political dance between China and the US that makes solutions to an archaic system of neglect so tragically, heartbreakingly complicated.

In both her novels, Talia Carner speaks for the children. Let us hope that someone of influence is listening.

Susan O'Neill, author, Don't Mean Nothing: Short Stories of Viet Nam

I must admit that I had very little knowledge of the orphanage situation in China until recently. From the moment I began reading Talia's Carners book I was drawn in. She does a fantastic job describing the dreaded situation that is evident from her research and developing a riveting storyline whose characters are very real in human nature, the Good and the evil. Her beautiful use of language paints a sad but necessary picture of the crisis in the orphanges that left me sickened but also inspired me to jump in and want to make a difference to help these children.

'China Doll' was a selection of the Friends of Huntingdon Valley Library Book Club and was discussed on October 18, 2007. Our questions were then answered by the author herself, Talia Carner, during a generously lengthy speaker-phone conversation with our members.

Our group was unaminous in their admiration for the talent of the author, the amount of research that went into the book, the importance of the message of infanticide and its human-rights implications.

'China Doll' left us with a great deal to think about concerning the "appeasment" vs. "engagement" policies between the U.S. and China.

An intriging, well crafted, page-turner.

China Doll by Talia Carner is by far the best suspense thriller I have ever read, and even surpassing John Le Carre, whom I admired greatly. What sets her wonderful book apart is the subject matter in addition to the terrific structure and plotting that make it unputdownable. This is a novel everyone (except perhaps the Chinese government) can care deeply about. The idea of babies languishing in dying rooms, unwanted and uncared for in order to satisfy population quotas, should be repugnant to any civilized nation. This book needed to be written. I can see no reason why with enough publicity China Doll doesn't make the Best Seller List. It cries out to be filmed. I love the worthwhile subjects of Talia Carner's books (Puppet Child). It's time the public learned to buy novels that actually have something important to say. I can't wait to read this author's next one.

I highly endorse Talia Carner's method of combining the artistry, intrigue, & freedom of a novel, but base it on extensive research exposing critical social issues. Her style lures the reader into becoming part of the story. "China Doll" is a page-turner. It deftly weaves suspense while characters come alive since Talia's insightful research was first hand. All characters are treated with compassionate understanding. The unspeakable horrors of China's orphanages, compounded by the one child policy & anti female bias, are revealed in a manner inviting constructive solutions which preserve dignity.
Talented artists inspire change because they metamophize into their characters, hence broadening perspective. Talia interrelates many issues, just as she does in her first novel, "Puppet Child," which is helping nationally to coordinate efforts to get each state legislature to pass the Protective Parent Reform Act. [..]

I've complained before in my reviews that I find it hard to find fiction I enjoy. Many best sellers tend to be murder mysteries, depressing tales of dysfunctional families, or pure fluff.

China Doll, however, is a novel I throughly enjoyed. The story itself is well-written, with all the elements of intrigue and romance needed to make it a page turner. (Yes, there is a dysfuntional family involved, but it worked in this story.)

There is also tremendous substance in this book, and a vitally important message. It exposes a terrible effect of China's one-child policy: gendercide and abuse in Chinese orphanages.

As a result, China Doll is a highly readable novel with an important social message. It ranks up there with serious fiction like The Poisonwood Bible. I recommend it highly.

In all fairness, I have to admit that I began reading this book already having some seriously negative biases. For one, the phrase "China Doll" is a racial slur. Nobody would ever write a book and give it the title "N-word"!? I find the title terribly offensive. Another bias: I find it the long, literary tradition of writing novels about orphans kind of weird. Orphans are real, and being an orphan is awful. Chinese orphanages are real and there are babies and children suffering in them right now. I don't think that is appropriate fodder for a pulp-fiction novel such as "China Doll." Lastly, my mother-in-law recommended this book to me, stating that it was fabulous, and she has terrible taste in books.
Since I am the mother of a daughter adopted from China, I will read anything pertaining to the topic. So, in spite of my initial misgivings, I read "China Doll."
Unfortunately, I didn't find any explanation/justification for the use of a racial slur as the title of the book. The book is so full of cliches that it reads like a particularly bad episode of "Murder, She Wrote." The protagonist has amazing talent, but has been living in a bubble, haunted by her horrible past... her husband is unfeeling, overly driven, and no longer understands her (maybe he never did! Waaa!) An exotic part-Chinese man, who is, of course, strong, silent, and terribly deep is somehow (inexplicably) attracted to the protagonist. His character was so insulting--reeked of orientalism, and he couldn't possibly be fully Chinese, because Chinese men are always portrayed an impotent in Western stories... But, I digress. To continue with the cliched characters....The Gay stylist, who keeps the protagonist fabulous... The loud-mouthed, fat, flamboyantly dressed, PR woman. Need I go on? Because I could-- there are more.
The very small portion of the book that actually dealt with adopting a child from China was factually incorrect, as was the information about the orphanages. If you read this book and haven't read anything else about adoption or orphanages, please don't think "China Doll" has given you any real information.
The author is good at what she does--the cliches are fully realized cliches, making it a fast and comfortably predictable read. Unfortunately, that is the only good thing I can say about this book.

What a powerful, multi-layered experience living with China Doll this weekend! I feel as if I've been to China. One-third into the book, I passed up a Saturday night movie so I could stay home and read late into the night.

It takes consummate skill to weave many stories into one--pop star, budding activist/mother, sister, daughter, wife, lover--and explain the transformative moment of being handed and falling in love with a baby, Lulu. Is this a suspense story (Grisham style), a double-love story? The author's use of imagery--flower, bird-- enables us to feel the loss, emergence and self-emancipation in the midst of dramatic escapes and rescues. I never saw the protagonist as a doll or caged bird; she has enormous family burdens and the fearsome taskmaster of her talent and career. (Even her religion, Judaism, is associated with suffering and yearning for freedom, never innocence.) Only babies have innocence, if there is love or at least humane care. But these are some of the contradictions that inform the drama.

Moral and political dimensions touch us deeply in China Doll. The human rights issues of our day form more than a backdrop: the Dying Rooms in China, the international adoption movement, the high-profile cases in faraway places with the emotional and legal dilemmas that cannot be disentangled. In China Doll, these well-researched issues are instrumental to the pulsing narrative line, but are never heavy handed. We come to see that orphanages in our time represent the human toll of oppressive regimes and dislocation when something or someone pushes back the curtain. So, there are troubling and real connections between a woman fighting to come into her own, a westerner fighting for the life of a baby, and the complex nature of help and rescue when it is regarded as exposure, intrusion or worse.

The rescue cases of this book (Nola's sister, baby, self) are depicted in their complexity: spiritual, power-charged, disruptive, and potentially self-serving or self-compromising. But we have no doubt: help is crucial and it takes a strong stomach. In the end this gripping story (that should also be a movie) brings us romance. But it also brings us rich conversations so that we not romanticize the risky and perilous nature of the personal and political and how much they are part of real love.

I have read this author previously, the writing and topic was so very different, and to be honest, too "Tellanovela"