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Socialism is Great! Lijia Zhang worked as a teenager in a factory producing missiles designed to reach North America, queuing every month to give evidence to the “period police” that she wasn’t pregnant. In the oppressive routine of guarded compound and political meetings, Zhang’s disillusionment with “The Glorious Cause” drove her to study English, which strengthened her intellectual independence – from wearing bright, western style clothes to organizing the largest demonstration by Nanjing workers in support of Tiananmen Square Protest in 1989. By narrating the changes in her own life, Zhang chronicles the momentous shift in China’s economic policy: her factory, still a ballistic missile manufacturer, won the bid to cast a giant bronze Buddha as the country went crazy for profit. Reviews “A beautiful memoir of this important period, when China began to recover from its political traumas and open to the outside world. Our current China literature is heavy with victim memoirs, but this is a true tale of aspiration: a young woman coming of age in a nation desperately trying to do the same” Lijia Zhang LIJIA ZHANG was born and raised in Nanjing. Her articles have appeared in many international publications, including South China Morning Post, Japan Times, The Independent, Washington Times, and Newsweek. She is a regular speaker on BBC Radio and NPR. She lives in Beijing with her two daughters.
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