"Calls Across the Pacific" by Zoë S. Roy

In Calls Across the Pacific, Zoë S. Roy recounts the journey of Nina Huang, a Chinese woman who when a teenager was sentenced to a re-education camp during Chairman Mao’s Cultural Revolution. She risks her life in a daring midnight escape past patrol boats to cross to Hong Kong on her first step to freedom. The book is presented in the form of a fiction, but its substance is that of a political science or history text assembled to present a first hand look at how Mao oppressed and degraded his own citizens.

Ms. Roy intends to exhibit in high relief the differences between open and closed societies; she sets out the jarring juxtapositions in can effective variety of forms. She also wants to provide a glimpse into the lives of those remaining unfortunate political prisoners who weren’t lucky enough to get out. She does an excellent job with the tasks she set for herself.

We experience the harrowing escape of a lucky, resourceful teenager, the bewilderment of her first experiences in the U.S., and her gradual assimilation. Throughout these events, she repeats her mantra of how good it is to be free to make

her own choices, to go to college based on her merits and not some state-wielded yardstick of political fitness. The lessons and observations continue to flow from one situation to the next, and they build to a coherent message: stating political beliefs should not be a crime.

Calls Across the Pacific is a valuable work of political science. For those interested in Mao’s China and his role in history, or in dissidence in totalitarian regimes, this book provides a valuable insider’s glimpse at a dark episode in China’s history.