The Secrets of Jin-Shei

A sweeping epic set in medieval China, this is the story of the Jin-shei sisterhood, a group of women who form a uniquely powerful circle that transcends class and social custom.

They are bound together by a declaration of loyalty more powerful than all other vows, even those with the gods: by their own secret language, passed from mother to daughter; and by the knowledge that some will have to pay the ultimate sacrifice to enable others to fulfil their destiny.

The sisterhood we meet runs from the Emperor’s sister to the street beggar, from the trainee warrior to the apprentice healer, from the artist to the traveller girl – herself an illegitimate daughter of an emperor. Then one of them becomes Dragon Empress. Her determination to hold power drags the sisterhood into a dangerous world of court intrigue, plot and counterplot. This brings them into a conflict from which they can only be rescued by the one who remains true to the vows she made at the very beginning to the dying Empress.

An amazing and unusual book, full of drama, adventure and conflict, The Secrets of Jin-shei is a novel about kinship and a society of women, all set in the wonderful, swirling background of medieval China.