Rating: 
Summary: As beautiful as a shooting star
Review: Beautifully descriptive, I love the combination of Ruth's modern-day life with the lovely, poetic story of LuLing's girlhood in old China. These are strong characters who captured my heart...once I began LuLing's story, I couldn't put the book down. Thank you to the author for sharing this story. I'm touched by its down-to-earth beauty.
Rating: 
Summary: *~ My iNsiGht ~*
Review: I myself am a Chinese-American who is striving to someday being a writer. Although I may be young and probably am not anymore Chinese than any other American in this country, I can say one thing about Amy Tan's writing. Her writing style is simple, something anyone can read. Some people might consider the conventionals utterly horrible, yet she has the talent and ability to keep you hooked throughout each page. I am not, however, deeply impressed. Every single book I have read (Kitchen God's Wife, Joy Luck Club, and the Bonsetter's Daughter) were all about the same thing. It was the same comment about Mother-Daughter Relationships, always a story about the mother's life back in China, and how the American born Chinese always marries the White guy and finds "her true culture" through her mother's stories. In reality, even I can tell that she makes up her own ...about Chinese people in her books. From the way she takes account of the mothers in every book it is obvious that she doesn't know as much about Chinese culture as she thinks. Overall, I think she's only okay as a writer. This book was just the same as any other book, and although it was an improvement and relatively interesting, I don't think she has come up with anything new. I think there are a handful of other Chinese-American authors who should have gained just as much or more recognition for their writing if someone like Amy Tan could! I respect her work, but I also think she needs to find new inspiration and new insight. Although I liked the aspect of having a Bonsetter's Daughter, showing the hardships women had back then, the system of concubines and wives, there's so much more about the Chinese culture than just the same old things.
Rating:
Summary: No future without a full knowledge of your roots
Review: Amy Tan is a very fine writer of Asian ascent. She is able to capture both women's psychology and Chinese culture and heritage in such details and nuances that it is a real pleasure to enter her world. This book concentrates on the relationship between an Asian-American daughter and her mother of pure Chinese ascent who immigrated after the Second World War. The mother is caught up in her old age by Alzheimer's and she is the victim of dementia. But bafore starting to lose her memory she committed to paper a story of her life in China. The daughter is intrigued by her mother's dementia that goes back to the past over and over again and she tries to find out what went wrong in those days that would explain the present situation. And when she finds her mother's pages, she finally can relate what she had lived in her youth with a tyranical and often frustrating mother and what her mother had lived in her early years in China. And little by little she discovers the great mystery of her grand mother and her dramatic fate. This first line of inquiry is doubled with the relation of the heroin with her manfriend and how their relation can evolve into a real permanent relation, after ten years of permanent non-permanence. The mother is the catalyzer of this evolution. And the mother finds some kind of happiness in this old age by being moved to a special assisted living institution, with her full agreement, though she is lured into the first three months' experience of it, and in finding some manfriend in the man who translated the pages she had left behind for her daughter. The very strong point of this novel is the entertwining of two cultures and especially the great importance of the Chinese heritage in the psyche of the mother, but also of the daughter due to the education she got from her mother. And this all comes to the search for the mystery grandmother and the ambiguity of the name she has been given over decades and decades of life in China, and in finding the real name of that grandmother. This is a really muticultural book because of this blend of cultures, influences, psychologies in the various characters and particularly in the daughter, a second generation Asian-American, who cannot really find her balance in American society if she does not totally assume the heritage of the mother's past that was transmitted to her indirectly through common life with her in her childhood and youth years. There is no balance of an individual if he or she does not assume the past and the roots of her blood line. Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, Paris Universities II and IX.
Rating:
Summary: Good But Not Great
Review: I've been waiting for the next Amy Tan book but The Bonesetter's Daughter was a bit of a disappointment. I believe wholeheartedly that Tan is a great contemporary writer. This just wasn't worth the wait. Maybe I'm measuring it by the previous novels but it lacked the sparkle and engrossing story of her former books. It moved slowly for me.
Rating:
Summary: An enchanted tale of fantasies
Review: I am a fan of Amy Tan and have read all her previous works. I heard about her new book "The Bonesetter's daughter" long before its publication and was eager to read it. Unfortunately, after reading it, I feel let down. In part one of this book, the author describes the cultural conflict between an eccentric Chinese immigrant woman and her American-born daughter in great detail. (This has been a recurrent theme in her previous books.) The fact that the mother's eccentricity is currently aggravated by Alzheimer's disease makes the narrative more dramatic, but not interesting enough to fill 149 pages. The second part of the book is about the family's past. I found the subject matter uniquely interesting, the story-telling captivating and the writing characteristically fluid. But for me, a person born and raised in China and educated in the States, the book does not describe a China that I am familiar with. Ms. Tan's China is overflowing with quirky Chinese sayings and bizarre superstitions. The book contains truthful facts about Chinese culture and histroy, but they tend to be exaggerated and so intertwined with fantasies as to make it all seem fictional. While Ms. Tan's approach to the subject matter is interesting and highly successful, I prefer to read books that impart a strong sense of reality. In " The bonesetter's daughter", I didn't feel I was reading the story of real people in a real world, but rather I felt I was in a fantasy, like an Anne Rice Vampire novel or a Harry Potter book. For me, reading this book was like watching a beautiful woman put on heavy make-up and strange costume; it spoils her true beauty, and, in the end, seems unnecessay.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful
Review: This was a wonderful book full of depth and rich culure. Amy Tan never fails to amaze me with her masterfully written novels appropriate for the melting pot we live in, today. This book is detailed, poignent and emotional. It has body and a three-dimentionality found in very few contemporary writers, today. Through the pages of the book slept a story of a girl, her mother and her mother's mother. Turning the pages awoke the story and unfolded the tale long put to bed- wonderful! The characters are full of life and full of energy. You can feel their pain, the happiness, their discomfort with dealing with the past and facing an uncertain future. Read it, read it, read it- it's worth the time, the money and wait at the library! :-)
Rating: 
Summary: A book to read before bed..it puts you to sleep
Review: I have been a fan of Amy Tan's books, I loved all of her previous books, so when I purchased The Bonsetter's Daughter I was so looking forward to reading it, however, it turned out to be a huge disappointment, it put me to sleep. I found it very slow and quite frankly boring!
Rating: 
Summary: Masterfully written...
Review: This is the first novel of Tan's that I have read. At first, I had a difficult time becoming engaged in the story. The story was not really something I enjoyed at the onset. However, as the plot thickens, and the work unfolds, Tan develops a beautiful story filled with history and rich in character. Tan's descriptions of China and Liu LuLing are wonderfully rich. Her mastery of the setting enfolds you in the story. Reading this book sweeps you off to another place and another time. I could taste her descriptions of food, feel her descriptions of pain, and envision myself in the settings she creates. This tale is incredibly bold. It deals with subjects that are realistic, and intriguing. It also weaves in historical information in a very effective manner. It is a poignant look into the world of a very interesting Chinese family. The only thing I didn't really enjoy was the first few chapters. The story set in China was so much more alive and interesting. The rest of the story seemed a bit lackluster. I understand why Tan chose to do this, but, I feel that there could have been more effective ways to address the past, present and future. If it were not for my online book club, I would have passed this book up. It is not a book I would normally read, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. All in all Tan presents a beautifully written story that is definitely worth the read.
Rating:
Summary: Mother and daughter find a common thread.
Review: I found "The Bonesetter's Daughter" to be a very touching story of a mother and daughter united by their shared past. Realizing that the time will come when her mother is no longer with her, Ruth attaches a new importance to her family history, and learns about the roots of her Chinese heritage. The most interesting part of the book was the way in which the author alternated between the present tense and the past. The story relates to a Chinese family, but it is a universal theme that would just as easily apply to a family from England, Russia, Israel, etc. I would recommend this book to anyone of any heritage, but especially to anyone who is particularly interested in discovering their own roots.
Rating:
Summary: A wondrous tale surrounded by a wooden one
Review: Having just read through some of the more recent reader reviews, I was startled at the complete concurrence of my own view and that of Frank Pettit (reviewer of April 9, 2001). In fact, since I am in complete agreement, and would simply point you to his review to avoid redundancy. However, for the attention impaired: Unlike "Joy Luck Club," there is no balance between the Chinese and the American sections. The former is intricate and riveting, the latter is lifeless and formulaic. Furthermore, the two aren't interwoven - the latter bookeneds the former in jolting and very uninspired fashion. And Tan still has yet to create a single believable male character, which reduces the validity of the male and female relationships (how can a woman feel so deeply about someone with no personality whatsoever?). Here's hoping for a return to form in her next outing.
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