<p>The Land Drenched in Tears is a moving history of the tumultuous years of modern China under Mao&rsquo;s rule, witnessed, experienced, and told through the personal lens of an ethnic minority woman, who endured nearly 20 years imprisonment and surveillance regime as a result of her political activism in Xinjiang, or East Turkistan, located in the far west of China.<br />
Writing her autobiography as an extraordinary melange of diary and memoir, which oscillates between first-hand narrative and flashback, the author, S&ouml;y&uuml;ng&uuml;l Chanisheff, traces her unfortunate youth from her university years, when she founded the East Turkistan People&rsquo;s Party as a result of her anger and frustration with communist China&rsquo;s devastating mishandling of the socio-economic life of the people of her native land, through her subsequent imprisonment in China&rsquo;s notorious labour camps as well as under the surveillance regime, to her emigration to Australia.<br />
Chanisheff&rsquo;s autobiography is a rare, detailed, and authentic account of one of the most poignant and most fascinating periods of modern China. It is a microcosmic reflection of the communist regime&rsquo;s tragic realities presented through the suffering and hope of a young woman who tied her fate to that of her beloved homeland.</p>