Will I love The Painted Veil?

This book is beautifully written and one of my favorites. It’s about a woman’s marriage, infidelity, and hardship in a foreign setting that ultimately brings about self-knowledge and awareness. Written in the 1920s, it might seem too old to be relatable, but I’ve read it several times and find it incredibly incisive and real.

The protagonist, Kitty, goes through a massive transformation, and by the end, I’m always impressed by how brave she is, and how smart. It’s a different kind of grappling with the past in this novel—here, it’s about facing what you thought you wanted, who you were… show more.

I love adventure stories that offer unexpected challenges in foreign lands. 

This story, set in upper-class England and rural China in the 1920s, is about Kitty, a selfish, beautiful, and attention-seeking woman, and the shy and unattractive English bacteriologist, Walter, who falls hopelessly in love and asks for Kitty’s hand in marriage. Kitty consents, but Walter’s discovery of her lover and the resulting social pressure, force the couple to enter into a marriage doomed for failure. 

Even though bitterness prevails, the couple set off for Walter’s assignment in the cholera-infected area of China. It is an act of suicide, fraught… show more.

Set and published in the 1920s, this novel wasn’t written as historical fiction. However, the backdrop of mainland China, and the situation the lead characters create for themselves is of another world and time. 

We follow Kitty who, in punishment for an affair, joins her scientist husband on a mission to a colony infested by cholera. Ultimately though, this is the story of a woman who learns the difference between passion and love. While the incorrectness of the time may be a little uncomfortable to read, Kitty’s determination that the next generation of women should be fearless and frank, and… show more.