Audio Book Description:
Red Poppies is the story of the wealthy Maiqi family: its powerful chieftain, his Han Chinese wife, his first son and heir, and his second,"idiot" sone, the novel`s narrator and unlikely hero. The time is the 1930s, the setting a stone fortress overlookingthe arid plains of inner Tibet. A feudbreaks out with a neighboring chieftain;an emissary of the Chinese Nationalists comes to the Maiqis` aid. In exchange, fields of poppies, valuable in theNationalist-backed heroin trade, are to be planted in a deal that enriches the Maiqis` lavish lifestyle and earns them dangerous enmity. Ambitious, sensuous, filled with intriguing characters, panoramic settings, and high drama, Red Poppies opens awindow on pre-occupation Tibet,dispelling many of the popular myths of a pacifistic society peopled by devout worshippers.
