Fortunate Sons

Reviews

"The story of the West's engagement with China is often told through the voices of colonists, correspondents and fortune-seekers who sailed East a century ago. Fortunate Sons is a captivating look at the reverse journey: a page-turning narrative about Chinese patriots schooled in the United States who returned home to modernize a moribund, imperial society. This book is a reminder that historically, US-China relations are more than political; Liebovitz and Miller have unearthed an important, and all but forgotten, story that resonates today." — Michael Meyer, author of The Last Days of Old Beijing: Life in the Vanishing Backstreets of a City Transformed

"A fascinating and well-told history of this early educational exchange between China and the United States." — Peter Hessler, author of Country Driving: A Journey Through China from Farm to Factory

"The struggle that the boys faced between traditionalism and modernity, exacerbated by an intriguing and sometimes turbulent clash of cultures, is something that resonates clearly to this day." — Gavin Menzies, author of 1421: The Year China Discovered America

"I read this book in one sitting, utterly engrossed in the rugged journeys undertaken by the first generation of west-going Chinese scholars. To read this book is to understand the fundamental obstacles and frustrations all Chinese intellectuals faced then and now. A bunch of pigtailed Manchurian Yalies. What a paradox!" — Da Chen, author of Colors of the Mountain and Brothers