Eighteen Vats of Water


Book Description

As long as he can remember, Xian has wanted to be a great calligrapher, like his father. When he turns six, he's finally old enough to start studying. Calligraphy is more than writing--it's painting--and Xian learns how much work and creativity go into what look like effortless strokes. Based on stories still told about Xian and his father, famous calligraphers of the 17th century, Eighteen Vats of Water is about determination, creativity, and learning how to see, as well as the importance of family traditions.




Tipping The Velvet


Book Description

From the oyster huts of Whitstable to the music halls of Victorian London, Tipping the Velvet is the glorious first novel from this much-loved author 'Piercing the shadows of the naked stage was a single shaft of rosy limelight, and in the centre of this was a girl: the most marvellous girl - I knew it at once! - that I had ever seen.' A saucy, sensuous and multi-layered historical romance, Tipping the Velvet follows the glittering career of Nan King - oyster girl turned music-hall star turned rent boy turned East End 'tom'. 'Erotic and absorbing... Written with startling power' New York Times Book Review 'An unstoppable read, a sexy and picaresque romp through the lesbian and queer demi-monde of the roaries Nineties' Independent on Sunday 'Waters is an extremely confident writer, combining precise, sensuous descriptions with irony and wit' Observer




Legitimate Daughter’s Transmigration


Book Description

The genius technology woman brought the system over the handsome brother comes to support me the king of assassins was used as a bodyguard destroying the marriage contract torturing the scum of a man and being so elegant and unrestrained.




Daughter of the River


Book Description

From her upbringing in the slums of Chongqing to her sexual and intellectual awakening to her search to unravel the mystery of her birth, a coming-of-age portrait by a renowned poet and novelist details her turbulent life against the backdrop of Communist China.




The Magical Monkey King


Book Description

The mischievous Monkey King attempts to achieve immortality the easy way, gains god-like powers, and wreaks havoc in heaven.




Red Scarf Girl


Book Description

Publishers Weekly Best Book * ALA Best Book for Young Adults * ALA Notable Children's Book * ALA Booklist Editors' Choice Moving, honest, and deeply personal, Red Scarf Girl is the incredible true story of one girl’s courage and determination during one of the most terrifying eras of the twentieth century. It's 1966, and twelve-year-old Ji-li Jiang has everything a girl could want: brains, popularity, and a bright future in Communist China. But it's also the year that China's leader, Mao Ze-dong, launches the Cultural Revolution—and Ji-li's world begins to fall apart. Over the next few years, people who were once her friends and neighbors turn on her and her family, forcing them to live in constant terror of arrest. And when Ji-li's father is finally imprisoned, she faces the most difficult dilemma of her life. Written in an accessible and engaging style, this page-turning autobiography will appeal to readers of all ages, and it includes a detailed glossary and a pronunciation guide.




The History of the London Water Industry, 1580–1820


Book Description

How did pre-industrial London build the biggest water supply industry on earth? Beginning in 1580, a number of competing London companies sold water directly to consumers through a large network of wooden mains in the expanding metropolis. This new water industry flourished throughout the 1600s, eventually expanding to serve tens of thousands of homes. By the late eighteenth century, more than 80 percent of the city’s houses had water connections—making London the best-served metropolis in the world while demonstrating that it was legally, commercially, and technologically possible to run an infrastructure network within the largest city on earth. In this richly detailed book, historian Leslie Tomory shows how new technologies imported from the Continent, including waterwheel-driven piston pumps, spurred the rapid growth of London’s water industry. The business was further sustained by an explosion in consumer demand, particularly in the city’s wealthy West End. Meanwhile, several key local innovations reshaped the industry by enlarging the size of the supply network. By 1800, the success of London’s water industry made it a model for other cities in Europe and beyond as they began to build their own water networks. The city’s water infrastructure even inspired builders of other large-scale urban projects, including gas and sewage supply networks. The History of the London Water Industry, 1580–1820 explores the technological, cultural, and mercantile factors that created and sustained this remarkable industry. Tomory examines how the joint-stock form became popular with water companies, providing a stable legal structure that allowed for expansion. He also explains how the roots of the London water industry’s divergence from the Continent and even from other British cities was rooted both in the size of London as a market and in the late seventeenth-century consumer revolution. This fascinating and unique study of essential utilities in the early modern period will interest business historians and historians of science and technology alike.




Etiquette Guide to China


Book Description

This essential guide to Chinese etiquette will make embarrassing social blunders a thing of the past! Whether you're traveling to China for business or pleasure, whether your stay will be long or short, your visit will be more pleasurable and effective if you understand your host culture and how to work within it. This updated and expanded edition of the best-selling Chinese etiquette guide on the market addresses not just the puzzling protocols relating to name cards, bowing or shaking hands, bathrooms and public baths--but also what to do when entertaining Chinese dinner guests, attending a Chinese tea ceremony, taking the subway, and much more! It also provides the latest etiquette in mobile phone manners, texting, social media and other forms of digital communication. The glossary at the back of the book has been revised to include the latest technology-related words and expressions used in China today. Two new chapters address the changing role of foreigners in the workplace and the contemporary business style and etiquette used by the younger generation of China who are now increasingly cosmopolitan--but still very Chinese! Etiquette Guide to China includes everything you need to know to be a successful, courteous traveler: Hand gestures and body language How to address the Chinese Dining and restaurant manners Gift giving and celebration in China Entering into and understanding business relationships How to behave in professional situations Dealing with China's political culture The Chinese way of negotiating




Electric Transmission of Water Power


Book Description

Electrical supply from transmitted water-power is now distributed in more than fifty cities of North America. These include Mexico City, with a population of 402,000; Buffalo and San Francisco, with 352,387 and 342,782 respectively; Montreal, with 266,826, and Los Angeles, St. Paul, and Minneapolis, with populations that range between 100,000 and 200,000 each. North and south these cities extend from Quebec to Anderson, and from Seattle to Mexico City. East and west the chain of cities includes Portland, Springfield, Albany, Buffalo, Hamilton, Toronto, St. Paul, Butte, Salt Lake City, and San Francisco. To reach these cities the water-power is electrically transmitted, in many cases dozens, in a number of cases scores, and in one case more than two hundred miles. In the East, Canada is the site of the longest transmission, that from Shawinigan Falls to Montreal, a distance of eighty-five miles.




Red Kite, Blue Kite


Book Description

When Tai Shan and his father, Baba, fly kites from their roof and look down at the crowded city streets below, they feel free, like the kites. Baba loves telling Tai Shan stories while the kites--one red, and one blue--rise, dip, and soar together. Then, a bad time comes. People wearing red armbands shut down the schools, smash store signs, and search houses. Baba is sent away, and Tai Shan goes to live with Granny Wang. Though father and son are far apart, they have a secret way of staying close. Every day they greet each other by flying their kites???one red, and one blue???until Baba can be free again, like the kites. Inspired by the dark time of the Cultural Revolution in China, this is a soaring tale of hope that will resonate with anyone who has ever had to love from a distance.