The Middle Heart

by Bette Bao Lord

It is the summer of 1932, the year the Japanese conquered Manchuria, China's northeast region. Three children meet and become best friends for the summer, and blood brothers for a lifetime. They are: Steel Hope, the second son of the House of Li, a once-great clan which survives now on handouts from his grandfather, a merchant who trafficks whith the Japanese; Steel Hope's "bookmate," Mountain Pine, Steel Hope's servant and conscience; and the irrepressible Firecrackers, daughter of the Li's gravekeeper, who masquerades as a boy to take the place of a brother killed years earlier by the Japanese. At the end of the summer a tragic event -- a good deed gone awry -- splits them apart until they are grown.

During the subsequent years of war and cultural upheaval, the destinies of the three friends are realized -- their loyalty to each other tested by the demands of politics and patriotism, and by the question of where honor and obligation lie when confronted by love.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, China, Literature, Asian Literature, Unfinished, Book Club

370 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Bette Bao Lord is a Chinese American writer and civic activist for human rights and democracy.

With her mother and father, Dora and Sandys Bao, she came to the United States at the age of eight when her father, a British-trained engineer, was sent there in 1946 by the Chinese government to purchase equipment. In 1949 Bette Bao Lord and her family were stranded in the United States when Mao Zedong and his communist rebels won the civil war in China. Bette Bao Lord has written eloquently about her childhood experiences as a Chinese immigrant in the post-World War II United States in her autobiographical children's book In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson. In this book she describes her efforts to learn English and to become accepted by her classmates and how she succeeds with the help of baseball and Jackie Robinson.

Bette Bao Lord is a distinguished international best-selling novelist and writer, and served as chair of the Board of Trustees of Freedom House.
Her second novel, Spring Moon (1981), set in pre-revolutionary China, was an international bestseller and American Book Award nominee for best first novel. The Middle Heart (1996) spans 70 years of modern Chinese history, ending in 1989 with the student-led demonstrations at Tiananmen Square. Her children's book, In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson, has become a classic used in schools nationwide. Her true stories of Chinese people, Legacies: A Chinese Mosaic, was also a bestseller and chosen by Time Magazine as one of the five best non-fiction works of the year. Ms. Lord's works have received numerous awards and been translated into 15-20 languages.

In addition to chairing Freedom House, Ms. Lord has served on many other boards including the Newseum, The Freedom Forum, the International Broadcasting Board of Governors, the Council on Foreign Relations and WNET.
Bette Bao Lord received an MA from Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and her BA from Tufts University. She married Winston Lord, later an Ambassador to China, in 1963, and they have a daughter, Elizabeth Pillsbury, and son, Winston Bao.

Bette Bao Lord is a recipient of seven honorary degrees (including Notre Dame, Tufts, and Pepperdine) and many awards as author, democracy advocate and outstanding immigrant. These include the USIA Award for Outstanding Contributions. President Clinton in 1998 presented her the first Eleanor Roosevelt Award for Human Rights and hailed her as "someone who writes so powerfully about the past and is working so effectively to shape the future."

(Source: Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Ebookwormy1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pearl Buck brought English readers to China to experience the culture of her early life in her parents’ mission. Her Good Earth trilogy is a masterpiece that won a Pulitzer prize for Literature. I have thoroughly enjoyed everything I’ve read of Buck’s work. And yet, I longed for an inside perspective, something like what Alan Paton’s Cry the Beloved Country or Andre Brink’s A Dry White Season do for South Africa. While Buck represents the Western family discovering China, Bette Bao Lord embodies a Chinese family discovering America and translating China through her adopted English.

Betty Bao Lord was born and raised in Shanghai. Fleeing the Chinese Civil War, her family found refuge in America where they enjoyed a settled life in New York City with all the challenges of immigration from a far culture. I love Lord’s book for children, In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson, about a Chinese family finding new life rhythms after immigrating to New York City. I was eager to read some of her other work. Lord writes of her Chinese home for her English audience as a Mandarin insider steeped in classical Chinese culture and tradition, taking us one step closer the source than Buck.

The Middle Heart follows three young people who take the legendary oath from Romance of the Three Kingdoms as their own…
“We three, through of different clans, bind ourselves to one end. We swear to defend our country and save our people. We cannot undo our separate births, but on the same day we mean to die. May Heaven, all-ruling, and Earth, all-producing, read our hearts! And should we turn aside loyalty and forsake duty, may the gods and man smite us.”

Steel Hope, aristocrat’s son, his bookmate Mountain Pine, and Firecrackers, the peasant boy that turned out to be a girl, are united from the Japanese occupation in 1919 through the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989. Lord explores their paths together and apart through revolution, love, politics, triumphs, marriage, children, devastation, faithful acts and painful betrayals. Lord’s characters are made indelible by the Chinese pragmatism expressed in their development and the survival necessary for it to take place.

The scope of The Middle Heart is amazing. By location, Lord takes us to Wen Shui, ChongQing, Shanghai, the hinterlands of northeast China, and Beijing. In Chinese history, her characters live through Japanese occupation, the war to evict the Japanese, the corruption of the Nationalists, Civil War (Nationalists v. Communists), the Communist triumph/ take-over, Mao’s Great Leap Forward, Mao’s Cultural Revolution, Deng XiaoPing’s liberalization and Tiananmen Square suppression. These events are not mere staging for these wonderfully vivid characters, they are shaping the characters and their storyline throughout the plot. Fiction though it is, Bette Bao Lord’s The Middle Heart rings true. This book has become an all time favorite and I give it my highest recommendation.

For Pearl Buck's work, see
The Good Earth, Buck, 1931
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

For books about South Africa by native sons, see
Cry, the Beloved Country, Paton, 1948
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

A Dry White Season, Brink, 1979
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson, Lord, 1984
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

For a non-fiction presentation of this timeline from a Chinese family partially transplanted to the United States, see
Shanghai Faithful, Lin, 2017
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Ebookwormy1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pearl Buck brought English readers to China to experience the culture of her early life in her parents’ mission. Her Good Earth trilogy is a masterpiece that won a Pulitzer prize for Literature. I have thoroughly enjoyed everything I’ve read of Buck’s work. And yet, I longed for an inside perspective, something like what Alan Paton’s “Cry, the Beloved Country” or Andre Brink’s “A Dry White Season” do for South Africa. While Buck represents the Western family discovering China, Bette Bao Lord embodies a Chinese family discovering America and translating China through her adopted English.

Betty Bao Lord was born and raised in Shanghai. Fleeing the Chinese Civil War, her family found refuge in America where they enjoyed a settled life in New York City with all the challenges of immigration from a far culture. I love Lord’s book for children, “In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson,” about a Chinese family finding new life rhythms after immigrating to New York City. I was eager to read some of her other work. Lord writes of her Chinese home for her English audience as a Mandarin insider steeped in classical Chinese culture and tradition, taking us one step closer to the source than Buck.

The Middle Heart follows three young people who take the legendary oath from Romance of the Three Kingdoms as their own…
“We three, though of different clans, bind ourselves to one end. We swear to defend our country and save our people. We cannot undo our separate births, but on the same day we mean to die. May Heaven, all-ruling, and Earth, all-producing, read our hearts! And should we turn aside loyalty and forsake duty, may the gods and man smite us.”
Steel Hope, aristocrat’s son, his book mate Mountain Pine, and Firecrackers, the peasant boy that turned out to be a girl, are united from the Japanese occupation in 1919 through the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989. Lord explores their paths together and apart through revolution, love, politics, triumphs, marriage, children, devastations, faithful acts and painful betrayals. Lord’s characters are made indelible by the Chinese pragmatism expressed in their development and the survival necessary for it to take place.

The scope of The Middle Heart is amazing. By location, Lord takes us to Wen Shui, ChongQing, Shanghai, the hinterlands of northeast China, and Beijing. In Chinese history, her characters live through Japanese occupation, the war to evict the Japanese, the corruption of the Nationalists, Civil War (Nationalists v. Communists), the Communist triumph/ take-over, Mao’s Great Leap Forward, Mao’s Cultural Revolution, Deng XiaoPing’s liberalization and Tiananmen Square suppression. These events are not mere staging for these wonderfully vivid characters, they are shaping the characters and their storyline throughout the plot. Fiction though it is, Bette Bao Lord’s The Middle Heart rings true. This book has become an all time favorite and I give it my highest recommendation.

For Pearl Buck's work, see
The Good Earth, Buck, 1931
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

For books about South Africa by native sons, see
Cry, the Beloved Country, Paton, 1948
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

A Dry White Season, Brink, 1979
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson, Lord, 1984
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

For a non-fiction presentation of this timeline from a Chinese family partially transplanted to the United States, see
Shanghai Faithful, Lin, 2017
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Mikkel Baltzer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Normally I like these kind of books, but this seems to go on forever and ever and ultimately you loose interest in the story and the characters. The names of the characters alone are annoying; e.g. Cinnamon Tree, Mountain Pine and Summer Wishes.

[Becki Basley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I adore this author and I absolutely loved this book! Like the previous book of hers that I have read, "spring moon" this book takes me on a journey through time through the eyes of three friends and the people who lived them.

While the historical events are in the background and could be hard to relate to if you haven't read over 15 novels on this period like I have, it's an interesting perspective. It truly shows the futility of this time in Chinese history. It seemed during this period every part of society was interchangeably either on the pedestal or in the prisons. Very volatile.

Highly recommend for anyone who loves a very well written "real story" that begins and comes full circle but does not have the classic "Disney" happily ever after. Also for people interested in understanding Chinese history.

[Susan Chow-Dukhan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Three young people from different in backgrounds meet and become friends in 1932. This novel, which spans over five decades provides the reader a glimpse of life in China during it's period of turmoil, from the effects of war and Communism. During this period, our three main characters are destined to be separated and reunited, through turns of events out of their control and personal decisions, governed by ideals and a will to survive.
The passage of time disturbs the flow of the novel. Characters are reintroduced after a passage of time, but displays different ideals, beliefs and personalities than when we last read about them. The readers are not provided with sufficient information during the missing years, making it more difficult to accept the changes to the characters.

[Patricia · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Middle Heart is a sweeping history of the family of the House of Li, spanning their lives from 1932 to 1989. It is set in the times of the greatest upheavals in Chinese history, from Imperial China, through the world wars, the Japanese invasion, and the communist revolution that put Mao into power.

Throughout the decades, the plot follows the lives of Steel Hope, Mountain Pine, and Summer Wishes, who in their youthful companionship in 1932, form a lifelong bond, and take an oath that will impact their lives in the most profound and unexpected ways.

Bette Bao Lord, also author of the splendid "Spring Moon," unfolds and reveals the China that most Westerners know nothing about.

[Sherry Hession · Rating 3 out of 5]

Three children in China make a pact with each other and remain part of each other's lives for the rest of their lives, although at times, they are separated from each other for years at a time because of circumstances related to the political situation in China. An interesting look at China right before it became a Communist country and its growing pains as a Communist country.

[Indira · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have always been curious about how socialism won in China. And although I completely didnt expect the strong historical background, I love how this book gave me a close view of what happened during China's revolution. The characters are richly portrayed with lives so complex that I feel so sorry for them

[Faina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Several generations of the family in China from 1919 through events at Tiananmen Square in 1989. Forced Socialism destroying lives and families. Mao's labor camps so similar to Stalin's labor camps. Wonderful book!

[Audrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a great departure form the norm, historical fiction based in China. It really drove home just how much China changed during the 19th century. By the end, I was so attached to the three characters - Mountain Pine, Summer Wishes and Steel

[Siri Eggesbø · Rating 2 out of 5]

Godt språk men litt lei av Kina politikk. Skulle gjerne hatt hele fortellingen kun fra historisk tid da de var barn. Litt søkt story, men liker egentlig det, men ikke i denne

[Diana Bork · Rating 4 out of 5]

På dansk

[Patricia Murphy-Doman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this novel twice and think I'd like to read it again. I loved the historical events experienced by the three children/adults of different socioeconomic backgrounds.

[Nancy Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had read something else by Lord, but not this book. It was OK. A good history of China of a sweeping period, but the story didn't capture me.

[Anna Ligtenberg · Rating 4 out of 5]

ISBN 0394534328 - Reading the About the Author page before I began reading the book left me wary of what I might find on the pages. Building a career on writing books about the culture you're descended from, but have never really lived in, seems unlikely to result in ethnically-accurate stories. I can't say whether or not Lord hit her mark but I did, periodically, feel like I could have been reading a book set in almost any place, so I don't feel that she really drew the reader into China.

Steel Hope is the illegitimate son of Stone Guardian and his lover, Amber Willows. The woman he will know as his mother, Jade, is an odd mixture of an unattractive woman and a vain one, and is glad to claim Steel Hope as her own. Now she has given a son to the House of Li and still managed to maintain her figure. She even "allows" Amber Willows to serve as the child's wet nurse, bringing her crippled brother, Mountain Pine, too. In time, Mountain Pine will become Steel Hope's bookmate and best friend, neither boy aware of their blood relationship. The boys meet and befriend another young man, Firecrackers, and the three become inseparable - especially after it comes to light that Firecrackers is actually a girl and the daughter of the gravekeeper. They pledge an oath to always remain "brothers" and, despite the intervention of years and events, they do so.

They are rarely together over the years; at most times two of them are together but the third is not with them. For years after the gravekeeper's death, it is Mountain Pine and Steel Hope who are together, as they further their educations. Firecrackers, in the meantime, has made a new friend of a woman named Mushroom. Mushroom has introduced Firecrackers to the theater where she, as Summer Wishes, begins a career that will bring her back to her brothers. The boys find themselves in the audience as the stunning Summer Wishes takes the stage, then in the same bomb shelter with the dazzling actress... but, although both boys are taken with her, neither recognizes her until she tells them who she is. The trio of brothers is now, and for the remainder of the book, a strange sort of love triangle, wherein "doing the right thing" tends to outweigh love and the boisterous, headstrong young girl that was Firecrackers becomes a weak woman. The book spans the remainder of the their lives and the decades of upheaval in China.

I was bothered by some things - Firecrackers was a young girl who, posing as a boy, was presented as strong and capable and made of sterner stuff than Steel Hope, son of a wealthy family, and Mountain Pine, the cripple. Yet, as an adult, she seems to let everything outside of herself determine her fate in every way, from who she will marry and when she will marry him to the roles she will play. It's disconcerting that she is, rather abruptly to me, broken so easily. There is also the fact that Lord chooses not to name World War II or the Communist revolution or any other event that would help the reader differentiate between times. This gives the impression, for those not familiar with China's history, that she is writing about one very long, drawn out, even endless war, that lasts the length of Steel Hope's life. There seems to be little time during which the three friends' lives are not all about surviving the war just to die of old age - a strange, somewhat surreal effect that makes them seem even more tragic. Worse, since Chinese history isn't a big subject in American schools, there will be readers who remain lost most of the time and only recognize Mao and Tiananmen Square.

Lastly, every now and then, Lord writes in a vague way that's hard to explain. It is as if she expects that the reader should be able to follow this sort of odd, rambling, meandering, random train of thought process, so she put it down on paper - and I couldn't follow it. Thankfully, it wasn't frequent, but it was annoying, especially the times when the story was somewhat suspenseful. To suddenly have to try to decipher these ramblings was frustrating. All in all, though, a good book and an interesting story that could have benefited from a little less of that and a little more historically relevant info to put the reader in the right timeframe. I'd read more from Lord, but I wouldn't go out of my way to find it.

- AnnaLovesBooks

[Carol · Rating 4 out of 5]

I went to HS with the author. I had just finished Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, and this book seemed to be a perfect follow up since it's about a generation later in history. Of course, who doesn't want to read a book written by a former classmate?
I was touched by the depth and resiliancy of the characters and how deftly Bette wove the political life of the Chinese people of many levels of society into the stories of the individuals. It was rich and moving.
Now I want to read others of her books.

[Sonia Kuperis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an amazing, cross-generational story of life in China, pre, during and post revolution. It gives a human face tot he fickle tides of politics by tracing life in the House of Lai. Particularly outstanding were the sense of honor and self-sacrifice to protect the family. Also, the effects of cold indoctrination of the children to create the Red Army and it's lasting psychological effects. A very touching novel.

[Marvin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This novel sweeps over China's history from the Japanese invasion to the Tiananman Square Massacre, all told within an intimate family story. It was, not surprisingly, full of suffering. Yet somehow it had neither the powerful impact nor the feel of an epic that one might expect. It was certainly worthwhile, but it somehow fell short of its potential.

[Ellen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Three children become "blood brothers" and lifelong friends in the 1930s China. The invasion of the Japanese is dwarfed in brutality by the revolution, the years of Red Guard and re-education. The three are separated and reunited more than once and survive to become gray-haired and wiser than their youth suggested possible.

[Mililani · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really tried to like this book but there were breaks in the stories of the three main characters that are not duly explained. I had to try to figure out what happened so there was sense enough to continue on. This made the reading this book exhausting.

[Shirlyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another great book by this author, she really details the lives of women in China

[Sandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chinese history with some fiction written between the lines. Even the book art is beautiful. I'd love to read more from her collection.

[Liona · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyable but not remarkable.

[Lisa]

I'm always interested in learning about other cultures. This author does a nice job bringing the asian world to us within fiction.

[Dona Krueger · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great overview of China from pre Japanese invasion until Nixon's visit to China. I found it a bit slow going, but filled with history I knew little about.

[Linda Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Heartbreaking story of what communism did to nice hard working people. They did what they had to do to survive and that came at a high price. Very sad.

[windy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Starts out interesting, plot unravels with too many unlikely coincidences before the end.

[Karen reading]

A reread, 8/23/97