Jing Liu

A bare bones survey of a tumultuous time in Chinese history, spanning the 1911 revolution through World War I, the Second Sino-Japanese War, and World War II. The narrative mostly stays focused on the many rises and falls of flashy autocrat Chiang Kai-shek, while cutting frequently to the quietly growing influence of Communist Mao Zedong.

For me, the most eye-opening aspect was the way the Chinese populace was treated as disposable by invading powers, allies, and the Chinese leaders themselves. Chinese soldiers and civilians die in vast numbers as armies flow back and forth across the countryside. A key component of the Pacific Theater of World War II was the sacrificial attrition of the Chinese army to keep the majority of the Japanese military too occupied to shift focus against the maneuvers of the other Allied forces, much like the Russian front served to divide and grind down Nazi forces at the cost of massive numbers of Russian casualties.

The writing is spare for a history but still manages to fill large portions of each page. The art is simplistic, with a heavy reliance on maps and talking heads. Regardless, it gets the job done.… (mais)

I got a copy of this book through the Amazon Vine program to review. I don’t have a ton to say about this book. It is a decent comic history of Japan for the time period listed in the title. The history was easy to follow and the graphic diagrams help you to understand what’s going on.

The whole book was interesting and I found it surprisingly engaging given that I am not a huge fan of reading about history. My 10 year old son read it as well and said it was interesting and he liked it.

Overall a well done book about Chinese history that is easy to follow and will appeal to middle grade and older readers. I would recommend if you are interested in learning about Chinese history.… (mais)