Description
Book SynopsisWinner of the Independent Publishers Book Awards (Gold Medal, Romance) Set in China in the late 1800’s, The Secret Language of Women tells the story of star-crossed lovers, Zhou Bin Lian, a Eurasian healer, and Giacomo Scimenti, an Italian sailor, driven apart by the Boxer Rebellion. When Lian is seventeen years old, she accompanies her Swiss father, Dr. Gianluca Brasolin, fluent in Italian, to tend the Italian ambassador, at the Summer Palace of the Empress Dowager, where she meets and falls in love with Giacomo. Through voyage and adventure, their love intensifies, but soon is severed by Lian’s dutiful promise as the wife to another. Forbidden from pursuing her chosen profession as a healer, and despised because she does not have bound feet, she is forced to work in a cloisonné factory while her in-laws raise her daughter, Ya Chen. It is in Nushu, the women’s secret writing, that she chronicles her life life and her hopes for the future. Rebelling against the life forced upon her, she empowers herself to act out against the injustice and becomes the master of her own destiny. But her quest freedom comes at a costly price: The life of someone close to her, lost in a raging typhoon, a grueling journey to the Yun-kang Caves, and a desperate search for beauty and love in the midst of brutality.
Trade Review"Rich with history, The Secret Language of Women offers a beautiful and harrowing landscape of love found, lost, and hunted for – at all costs and with dire consequences. Like the bound feet, so idealized in her novel, Romano’s characters are broken and reformed into both the beautiful and the grotesque. Haunting." —Barbara Wood, New York Times bestselling author
"The Secret Language of Women is a powerful and enchanting read. A brilliantly well-written tale that takes readers on one woman's journey. For fans of Romeo and Juliet fans this is a must read [...] I loved reading Nina Romano's stunning piece, and I recommend it to readers world wide." - San Francisco Book Review
"This is a beautiful story of hope and love stronger than any adversity. Very special historical fiction that is highly recommended!" - Historical Novel Society
"A stunning look at China at the turn of the twentieth century, this is a love story that crosses boundaries both cultural and geographic." - Foreword Reviews
Winner of the Independent Publishers Book Awards (Gold Medal, Romance)
"The Secret Language of Women is visionary, ambitious, and lyrically written. One comes to the end of it feeling as though she has traveled through a time machine, into a world so different, so vivid and real as to linger in the mind long after turning the last page." - Wraparound South
