Just finished
China Boy based on one of my reader's recommendation. An enjoyable easy read, although the author's romanization scheme for chinese words was annoying to someone accustomed to modern pinyin. I'd recommend it as great summer reading, so hurry up with the week or two we have left.
I did have one problem with the book however...
The main character has three older sisters, each given their English names by their mother's tutor prior to the family's flight from China (their father being a KMT soldier and therefore on 'the wrong side of history'). The youngest sister's name struck me as reasonable -- Janie. It sounds like a name you'd expect to hear in an 'Our Gang' short. However, the two older sisters were given the English names Jennifer and Megan... Neither of those struck me as being names that a Chinese tutor of English language would have chosen in the late 30's or early 40's.
This would have only remained a nagging doubt, were it not for
eggy's serendipitous linking of
The Baby Name Wizard. It would appear that my gut feeling was at least partly right... neither Megan nor Jennifer really appear in the rankings until the 1950's (well, ok, 40's for Jennifer). Janie meanwhile was at least in the rankings in the 1930's, and well before... Still, I suppose to modern ears having a character named Imogene would sound ridiculous, and perhaps even retard book sales.
