Chitra Banderjee Divakaruni’s—Before we visit the goddess

This is a tale of three generations of women and the mistakes and hardships they face both in India and in the U.S.

Sabitri dreams of going to college so she can rise above her mother’s poverty-stricken life. She is given the opportunity by a rich family her mother makes mitai for, but her dream evaporates because of her ill-fated love. When her daughter, Bela is in college she is distressed by Bela’s relationship with Sanjay, a political Bengali rebel. Bela abandons her studies and flees to the U.S. to reconnect with Sanjay—the second generation to forsake her studies for love. In Bela’s daughter’s teenage years, will she do the same?

Arthur Golden’s — Memoirs of a Geisha *****

When Sayuri is a child in a poor fishing village, she is sold into slavery to a Kyoto geisha house. As she grows, she is groomed to become a geisha and is soon visiting teahouses dressed in fine kimonos and competing with a jealous rival.

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Lisa See’s — Shanghai Girls *****

Two sisters, Pearl and May, lead exciting lives in Shanghai until their father’s once rich lifestyle is gambled away. Their father is forced to sell his daughters as wives to men in California seeking wives. Escaping from invading soldiers, they journey across to U.S.A. to begin new lives with the strangers they’ve married. This is Lisa See at her best.

Another five out of five is her Lady Tan’s Circle of Women. Set in Wuxi in the 1400s, Yunxian is sent to her grandparents after her mother dies and her father leaves to study for an exam. When Grandmother Ru sees the potential in her granddaughter, she begins to share her medical knowledge with Yunxian until it is time for her marriage. Under her mother-in-law, she is forbidden to practise medicine, but Yunxian cannot bear to see other women suffer because male doctors can only question women behind a curtain, thus leading to many unsuccessful diagnoses.
Set within a rich Chinese family’s compound, with customs such as seclusion of women and foot binding, this is a tale of Tan Yunxian’s life against all the richness of the times.

Eugenia Kim’s — The Calligrapher’s Daughter *****

Najin doesn’t want to live a traditional Korean life, but her father tries to force her into a marriage with an aristocratic family. Her mother, defying the traditional obedient wife, arranges a position for her daughter in the king’s court as a companion to a young princess. With Japan’s control over the country and the dying monarchy, Najin’s life becomes oppressive. When she unexpectedly finds love, they are soon separated and she must face Japan’s attack on China and Pearl Harbour while her husband is an ocean away.