Peony in Love-Mia Bohling

Bohling, Mia
English per. 4
Nov. 12 2008

Peony in Love-Mia Bohling

The book that I read is called Peony in Love by Lisa See. I selected this book because I read one of
her other books called Snowflower and the Secret Fan, which is also an amazing book, and I was looking at the back
of the book and saw the title of this book. I looked it up on the computer and thought it would be a very
excellent story. I picked this book out of all of the rest because the title made me very interested. Love
stories are always interesting to me.

Peony in Love is a story of a sixteen year old girl in seventeen century China who sets eyes on a
man at a play and secretly meets with him three times and they fall in love. Sadly they know that their love cannot
be because they are both already betrothed. Soon Peony becomes lovesick because her and her lover cannot be. She then
becomes obsessed with the play The Peony Pavilion, which is were she met her love, and writes along the margins of
her playwrights what she thinks of the play and her personal poems. It was her life. Peony has stopped eating ever
since. In an attempt to stop her lovesick ways her mother burns her project except the one copy of the The Peony
Pavilion. Two weeks before she gets married her father tells her who she is going to marry and she is filled with happiness
and joy. She goes outside on the palanquin which she thinks she is going to marry her lover, and is let outside the gate to
die. Once she is in her after life she cannot be set free because no one has dotted her ancestral tablet, so she spends her
life as a despised hungry ghost manipulating people the way she wants them to but only to be crushed once more.

A quote I think has a lot of value is "In that moment I understood that the cruelest words in the
universe are If only." I think this quote has a lot of significance because if any thing bad or unfortunate happens to you
you would wish, if only they never happened to you. For example if you get an F on a test you would most likely think, if
only I studied last night! I chose this because the first time I read it that that quote was so true! This quote is very
important to the story because if only Peony had looked when her father announced who her husband would be, then she would
have never been lovesick because she would be marrying him, and that would mean she would never be a hungry ghost. If only
Peony had done so many things she would have never been lovesick, but it is to late.

To rate my book I have made my rating system of 1 being the lowest, and 5 being the highest. The icons are peony flowers.
I used peony flowers to represent her name and, when he strokes her body with the peony flower. I give this book 5 out of
five peonies.


There are so many reasons why you should read this book. One it will show you the customs, believes and traditions of the
ancient Chinese culture. Another is that it is a great love story of true love and the battles you have to concur to get it.
It is also an amazing read, that you wont be able to put down! This story is also based on a true story, and i think that
makes it even more interesting! I would recommend this book to any mature person who can handle the mature content of
this book. This book would be good for tenth graders and above, but if you're mature then go for it and read it. Now this
book has sex and sexual content, so if you no you are not allowed, or can't handle reading this book, please do not read it.