A love story between a woman and a country, and a woman and a man, Field Notes from Sichuan: Learning to be a Foreigner is a novel based on the author’s experience living in China in the 1980s. Excited to finally be in a country just opening to the outside world, Suzanne Wright, fresh from the idealism of the civil rights movement in the US, soon finds there is more to living in another culture than intriguing trips to remote villages and intense conversations with new friends. A keen observer of both China’s move from rural to urban life and of her own encounters with culture shock, she struggles between feeling at home and being a perpetual outsider. As she is drawn ever deeper into the Chinese world, she confronts a choice between loyalty to friends and her own cherished desires.
Black and white photos of daily life in and around Chongqing enhance the text
