Revolution Is Not a Dinner Party (by Ying Chang Compestine)

Ling is a child in China during the waning years of Mao's Cultural Revolution. She and her mother struggle to survive as food grows scarce and is rationed, electricity is interrupted, her doctor parents lose their jobs, and a political officer moves into their apartment, with the family getting no say in the matter. Ling's father is taken away to jail, she is targeted by bullies at school, and the family is persecuted by the Red Guards.

To a Western child growing up in comfort and privilege, stories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution can be hard to understand as history. It can seem more like a tale of an insane asylum where the inmates have taken over, and the lack of sense and logic can be almost as frightening as the violence. Compestine's decision to fictionalize her memoir was a good one; it makes the history far more approachable than, say, a book such as Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution by Ji-li Jiang, which is more realistic but, by the same token, harder to relate to. REVOLUTION IS NOT A DINNER PARTY won many awards, including the California Book Award for Young Adult Fiction, made the 2007 Publisher's Weekly Best Children's Fiction list, and was named one of the American Library Association's Best Books for Young Adults in 2008, and was nominated for the California Young Readers Medal in 2012.

As storybook heroine Ling is very relatable. Her determined defiance of the bullies and Red Guards is admirable, exciting, and satisfying. The events of the book, carefully described so as not to be too overwhelming to the younger reader, often seem like escapades or adventures. Her growth in maturity and inner strength makes this as much a coming-of-age novel as an historical one. All of these features make it an excellent introduction for upper elementary and middle school readers to this frightening period in Chinese history.