"River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze" by Peter Hessler

Finally.  It took me forever to read this book.  Not because it was bad -- quite the contrary.  But it was dense, and life intervened in the form of months of travel cancelled while the virus and protests upended the world.  I just couldn't concentrate enough to finish it.  But I finally did.  I went to China a little over a year ago and was transformed.  Such an amazingly different world, a true Communist state, a place where I was obviously different from everyone we saw (I was
"waiguoren" and never forgot it).  It was a powerful experience, one I have never successfully been able to find the words for.  Peter Hessler, who spent two years there as a Peace Corps teacher, did.  He captures beautifully the unique "feel" of China -- the land and her people.  It is a culture like no other and he takes the time in this memoir to explore the details of his interactions, describing each of the little realizations and surprises.  I loved reading this book because it brought me back there, to my own experience, seeing a place which was so unlike anything I have seen before.  Mr. Hessler deals with it all very gently, seeing the flaws, the promise, and his own struggles to comprehend, well, everything.  The book is more than twenty years old yet it has not aged much, I feel.  The differences in Fuling today are stark, but the people, the atmosphere ... I would venture to say they have not changed much.  What has changed?  Fuling is not there.  The city I saw replaced the one which now lies under the Yangtze.  I doubt that Peace Corps volunteers still go there.  I'm all but certain there is no Catholic Church, or any church, as the past ten years have been marked by a government cracking down, tightening its grip, rather than the hope in this time as Deng Xiaoping was trying to modernize and open his country, even if only by small cracks.  The Chinese people remain strong, stubborn, bound by tradition and tremendously loyal, regardless of what outsiders may say.  It is worth a read to anyone who thinks, as I did, that this massive country has moved past its Communist roots.