This story is set in Vancouver's Chinatown at the turn of the 20th Century and follows the life of a servant girl from China who longs to bring her mother and brother to join her in the New World.
| ||||||||||||
Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From School Library Journal
Kindergarten-Grade 3-This tender story about Chinese immigrants to Canada opens in their homeland, as Yenyee's fisherman father gives her a jade pendant carved like a fish. When a typhoon blows up while he's out at sea, she throws the necklace into the water to bargain for his life. Still, he drowns, leaving her family penniless. Reluctantly, the girl accepts a job as caregiver to May-jen, the village merchant's daughter, and accompanies them to the New World, where both girls are terribly homesick. When May-jen nearly drowns in the ocean and Yenyee rescues her, miraculously finding the lost jade pendant, it marks a turning point in the older girl's acceptance of their new home. Deliberately naive color illustrations, composed of strong, simple forms, subtly portray a range of emotions from sorrow and desperation to happiness. Dramatic, wordless spreads advance the narrative. The art conveys a clear sense of place but confuses readers' sense of time by showing the immigrants traveling by sailboat at the turn of the 19th-century to a country where little girls wear short skirts and socks. In a few sentences, Yee's phrasing becomes formal and stilted. Nevertheless, art and text combine into an engaging story with emotions that children will understand.
Margaret A. Chang, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, North Adams
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
Margaret A. Chang, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, North Adams
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
Review
Grace Lin's illustrations range from expressive portraits that poignantly capture the characters' melancholy and tumultuous emotions to actioned-packed scenes that evoke the dangerous beauty of the sea in Van Gogh-like swirls of textured brushstrokes.- Quill and Quire, May 2002
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Ages 3-8 will enjoy this beautiful folk story,
By Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Jade Necklace (Hardcover)
Ages 3-8 will enjoy this beautiful folk story, embellished with Grace Lin's warm drawings and capturing the immigrant experience from the eyes of a young Chinese girl whose beloved fisherman father vanishes at sea. Good reading skills will lend appreciation to this story of a girl's growth.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product).
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
