Madame Chiang Kai-shek is the first biog- raphy of one of history's most intriguing and controversial political figures, Beautiful, brilliant, and captivating, the woman known as China's Eternal First Lady wielded unprecedented official and unofficial power during China's long and violent civil war. She passionately opposed Chinese Communism and influenced decades of American foreign policy.
In a life that spanned the twentieth century (1898-2003), Madame Chiang bore witness to China's tempestuous evolution from the imperial Qing Dynasty through the Chinese Revolution, the Japanese invasion of World War II, the tri- umph of Chinese Communists on the mainland, and the end of colonialism in Hong Kong. ……