Book: See, Lisa. Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (2005)

My best friend and I have been friends since we were nine-years-old. We met on the very first day of fifth grade. It was a warm, sunny September day and I wore black leather pants and a pink button down shirt with gold edged ruffles down the front. My bestfriend says that when she saw me, she knew that she would have to get to know me because what nine-year old comes to school in leather pants? We have been together for twenty-five years now. We are both Aquarians, born on the Dragon's tail almost a month apart in 1977. She is an inch and a half shorter than I am and we wear the same shoe size, although, I have inherited my father's narrow feet. She is more than a friend and more than a sister, she is my soul mate.

It is this type of relationship between women, built of love and friendship, that hooked me into Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. It tells the story of Lily and Snow Flower, two rural, nineteenth century Chinese girls who are contracted at the tender age of eight to be "laotong," old-sames. Laotong was a formal and rare relationship between women. It was a relationship that was "made by choice for the purpose of emotional companionship and eternal fidelity." Unlike sworn sisters, the relationship was exclusive and lasted through marriage, childbirth, and widowhood. Snow Flower and the Secret Fan follows Lily and Snow Flower through lives filled with love and hardship. It explores the nature of love, fate, friendship, women, and their place in a patriarchal society that values boy children above all else.

( I tried to fulfill their expectations for me - to attain the smallest bound fee in the county - so I let my bones be broken and molded into a better shape )