Rating: 
Summary: A great re-telling of a fascinating global history event
Review: Diana Preston truly shows her talent at the narrative history genre with this book. I purchased it originally in 2000 because it was the newest book released on the Boxer Rebellion and I was doing research on the event. However, re-reading it three years later, I can still sit back, close my eyes, and imagine what it must have been like to be a beseiged foreigner in that setting. If you're interested in this particular piece of Chinese/Global history... then this is the best book out there.
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Summary: Excellent !!
Review: Excelent book for people who only know little information about a very difficult time.Ms Preston does an excelent job in presenting both sides of the conflict in a very easy way to understand.She describes with very good eye the causes of the conflict, what happened during the conflict and, at the end, what does it all mean to China and Great Britain.Her account is excellent because the way she describes the events makes you feel like you are reading a thriller,but dont be confused this only adds to her great understanding of the conflict which makes for a very good reading.One of my favorite sections of the book is when she cites testimony from the people who where inside the embassies when attacked and how was life while being sieged.Also it is very interesting to read about those same people once the got out and when back to their respective countries...Good work!
Rating:
Summary: In-depth coverage of a fascinating event
Review: I read this book for one reason: I did not know much about the Boxer Rebellion. Now having read the book I am amazed at the atrocities committed during the summer of 1900 in Beijing. It's really a fascinating story and one that not that many people know. Preston does a good job at using a wide variety of personal journals and other primary sources to tell the story from the insiders point of view. Many times she, like any good historian, is only there to fill in the gaps. This is an informative and interesting book that reads quickly. Highly Recommended for anyone interested in the topic.
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Summary: Preston hits the mark relentlessly
Review: I'm a little bemused by readers whose centers of cultural gravity lie well out of "Western" spheres of influence. Diana Preston's style is both arch and exceedingly dry. Her cynosure is far too bright for comfort, and I imagine all her principal characters -- East or West -- must feel rather like ants caught in the focused solar beam from a wayward child's magnifying glass. The catalog of Western imperial sins against China, beginning with the Opium War, is seldom displayed in the U.S. or Britain; but it's remarkable how damning some of Preston's asides can be: "The Americans specialized in shipping Turkish opium to China, and in consequence the Chinese believed for many years that Turkey was part of the United States." However, it's probably also true that most of us are too thick-skinned to notice these pricks of conscience. It is amazing how we seem to blunder into the great chapters of history (Vietnam, Iraq...) as though all our roadmaps were drawn a century ago in the Middle Kingdom.
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Summary: Engrossing account of the sieges; but Chinese views lacking
Review: Make no mistake - while Diana Preston's The Boxer Rebellion is a story told with great skill, the author is not a China scholar and the events she describes are largely related from the Western point of view. In fact, a more fitting title of the book would be "The Siege of the Foreign Legations During the Boxer Rebellion."The book starts and ends with some background information and history concerning the Boxers, a semi-religious movement that swept through China's north in the last years of the 19th century. The boxers' anti-missionary and anti-foreign anger was channeled by Chinese provincial and imperial officials to counter foreign territorial and religious ambitions, but this force soon turned to violence which led to the slaughter of thousands of Chinese christians and foreign nationals. It also resulted in the siege of the foreign enclaves in Beijing and Tianjin as well as the Beitang Cathedral in Beijing. It is the accounts of these sieges - and the subsequent military operations to relieve them - that takes up the majority of the book. Preston's exciting prose takes readers back to the tense summer of 1900, drawing on the personal accounts of the people involved. It was a very desperate time, and the author weaves a vivid portrait of the crisis as seen from behind the baricades. However, it becomes clear early in the book that Preston is drawing mostly on the Anglo-Saxon/Western European views of the crisis. It is very telling that French, not Chinese, is the most oft-quoted foreign language in the book, and there is not a single personal account from a Chinese person, except for a few stories of Chinese christian converts as related by Western missionaries. The same can be said of the Russians and Japanese, who played a major part in the events of this period, yet are almost always seen through the prism of British and American eyes. It would have been interesting to see their fears, feelings and motivations described in their own words. Other problems include the use of old-fashioned and inaccurate Chinese romanization systems, instead of the more widely accepted pinyin standard; the incorrect rendition of Chinese terms and place names ("Fulan Gong", "Uruqami", etc.); and an apparent unfamiliarity with basic aspects of Chinese society and and culture. For instance, readers will be hard-pressed to find a single reference to "face" - as in "losing face" or "giving face" - a concept that is key to understanding the Chinese people and the way they deal with themselves and outsiders. It is true that there is a lack of Chinese sources about the Boxer Rebellion and the siege of the legations. For instance, diaries by Ci Xi and her ministers and generals were either never written or did not survive the turmoil of the early 20th century. Still, Chinese media articles, imperial edicts and other correspondence must exist from that period, and it would have been interesting to have some of these accounts in the book.
Rating: 
Summary: A Good Introduction to the Boxer Rebellion
Review: Preston does a very good job in putting together a highly readable imperial account of the seige at Beijing. Of particular note is her description of the initial imperial dispositions of the Great Powers in Peking, and the battles that took place not only in the capital but also on the river and rail approaches to the city. The seige was not just a race to save foreigners in Beijing, but also a race to save China from completely disembowling itself in civil war. Or course the actions, overreactions and the rapacious behaviour of the foreign relief forces is also well chronicled. Of particular note is the sacking of the Summer Palace. It is also interesting to see that the British viewed the Japanese as the most civilised of their relief allies and the French and Russians little more than barbarians. I do not think that this is best account of the Boxer rebellion and it isn't the most fast paced. I think that the accounts in Chris Hibbert's "The Dragon Wakes" to be an altogether more fast-paced study of the war. There are few Chinese sources as well, but then this is meant to be a narrative history, and not a full-blown scholarly enterprise. A good imperial read.
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Summary: Epic Tale of Military History
Review: The author has done a magnificent job of describing the events leading up to and culminating in the Boxer Rebellion, most notably depicting the siege of the foreign legations in Peking. The latter event is the subject of a great movie (55 Days In Peking, with Charlton Heston and David Niven), but the book is obviously a more detailed and accurate description of a unique time in history when Chinese resentment of foreign influence and exploitation led to a rebellion that was spearheaded by a nationalistic group of martial arts hooligans who were not so secretly being supported by the Empress Dowager and government troops. The inter-action between the various foreign diplomats and their embassy guards in the defense of the embassies is very interesting, as is their less than charitable protection of the Chinese Christians who looked to them for protection. All Christians were equal unless you happened to be Chinese, in which case you were expendable. The moral hypocrisy of the missionaries was unbelieveable. A great read though, especially if you are a fan of 19th century military history and enjoy reading about esoteric conflicts in exotic settings.
Rating:
Summary: Epic Tale of Military History
Review: The author has done a magnificent job of describing the events leading up to and culminating in the Boxer Rebellion, most notably depicting the siege of the foreign legations in Peking. The latter event is the subject of a great movie (55 Days In Peking, with Charlton Heston and David Niven), but the book is obviously a more detailed and accurate description of a unique time in history when Chinese resentment of foreign influence and exploitation led to a rebellion that was spearheaded by a nationalistic group of martial arts hooligans who were not so secretly being supported by the Empress Dowager and government troops. The inter-action between the various foreign diplomats and their embassy guards in the defense of the embassies is very interesting, as is their less than charitable protection of the Chinese Christians who looked to them for protection. All Christians were equal unless you happened to be Chinese, in which case you were expendable. The moral hypocrisy of the missionaries was unbelieveable. A great read though, especially if you are a fan of 19th century military history and enjoy reading about esoteric conflicts in exotic settings.
Rating:
Summary: Good basic story on the Boxer Rebellion
Review: This book proves to be a very readable and interesting book on the Boxer Rebellion. Its was generally written for the casual reader type so the writting proves to be clear, and it was pretty well researched from the western point of view. But since the book was written from that perception, I have no problem not having the Chinese view on the situation. I would say this book is a very good introductory effort for any reader who are interested in this subject. There are other books, far more in-depth in nature that can fulfilled further study if needed.
Rating:
Summary: An appetizer without the main course.
Review: This book was well written but it covers only the westerner's side of the story. High marks for details of individuals'experiences in the legations. This is a good eye witness account book. However the narrative can get a bit tedious as there were too many bits and pieces that failed to make up the whole story. It does not tell you much about the motivations of either sides involved other than putting simply to greed and egos. The chinese was basically reduced to the status you normally see of natives in a black and white Tazan movie. This book is only one third of a complete story. The other two thirds being from the point of the chinese, both christians and otherwise,as well as an indepth analysis of how the events arose and ended. For research purposes, this book has very little to offer. It's a good read, which unfortunately makes it sadder because of what it could have been.
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