Chinese Cinderella

      So far, I have found my non-fiction book Chinese Cinderella by Adeline Yen Mah a very interesting read. Yen Mah's book is about her life when she was younger and takes place in the 1940's when she was around four years old. Yen Mah also discusses how no one in her family really appreciated her, except for her Aunt Baba and her big brother, even though she tries to win medals to achieve love from her father and her siblings. Her family considers her as bad luck since Yen Mah's mother died after giving birth to her. Life for Yen Mah and her siblings does not get any better when her father remarries. Yen Mah and her siblings are subjected to their stepmother's hatred while her half brother and half sister are completely spoiled.
      The first scene of the book shows how smart Yen Mah is by talking about her first ever medal in school and introduces the readers to Aunt Baba, the only one who really appreciated Yen Mah. It also explains how rich her family was, but once her father gets in trouble with the Japanese he runs away and leaves all of his children behind and goes to Shanghai  while her stepmother soon followed afterwards bringing her son along with her, but they do come back for Yen Mah and her other siblings a few months later.
      The next few chapters discuss Yen Mah's life in Shanghai and her relation with her siblings and stepmother. On Yen Mah's first day of school everyone forgets about her first day so she gets one of the family's workers to drop her off, but when her first day is over nobody remembers where she was and she tries to walk back home with little success. Her siblings still treat her as bad luck and take her food at the dinner table while her stepmother expresses her hatred for Yen Mah after she tried to defend one of her siblings from her.
     Clearly the author's life was not the best one out there. She's been treated badly by her family and the only ones who appreciate her are one of her big brothers and her Aunt Baba. Even though she may win prizes at school, they are not what she really wants. What she really wants is the love and understanding of her whole family.