At the Dawn of the New China: An American Diplomat's ... (ISBN 1891936751)

A touching memoir with rich historical insight:
Richard Williams's story is unique and multidimensional. His work in setting up a new American diplomatic mission, his Chinese wife reuniting with brothers and sisters just emerging from the ravages of the Cultural Revolution, and his kids' experiences as the only foreign teenagers in the city all lead him into areas of Chinese society and life seldom accessible to foreigners. The result is a memoir of unparalleled richness. And it goes way beyond that. By including declassified diplomatic cables and newspaper accounts, Williams situates his personal experiences in the wider perspective of what was happening with China globally and Sino-American relations in particular. He combines a touching family saga with an in-depth portrait of a China on the brink of historic change.

The life of an American diplomat and his family:
Just as the title says, At the Dawn of the New China gives us a benchmark perspective on the amazing transformation that's taking place in China. And it's the first book I've come across that actually helps me solve the mystery of just what it is our diplomats are trying to do for us out there in the trenches. I myself was the child of an expat living in Asia around the same time and the book brought me back to my childhood and memories of growing up in a foreign land.

Fascinating, modern, pre-ascendant, far, different, foreign.:
This is a fascinating book, a window on modern, pre-ascendant China, the work of an American diplomat, and his family's life in Guangzhou. I found it fascinating in part because I was born and lived (obviously, or I wouldn't be here to write this) in the Far East in the early 1970s, when most of it was still a different world from the West, before both (along with the rest) were homogenized by "globalization." But the book is fascinating for reasons other than my own. Richard Williams was in Guangzhou at a time when it was still foreign to Americans and America was still foreign to it. Business deals failed because free markets were new and still alien. Today, Guangzhou is not only a high-technology manufacturing center, but a locus of R & D as well, and China is no longer remote. Richard Williams' family bridged the gap between China and America by living in Guangzhou (and, later, Hong Kong) and because his wife is Chinese and his children inherently multicultural.

A window into a period of Chinese history that few Americans saw:
Reading this book was like having dinner with a diplomat -- and not the guarded bureaucratic kind. Williams has an eye for colorful detail and absurdity, and recounts tales of everything from negotiating with recalcitrant local officials to getting accustomed to squat toilets. Anyone who's visited China in the last decade or two will be particularly fascinated by Williams' account -- so much has changed since then, yet much remains the same.