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Eat the Buddha

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First published: 2020
Pages: 294

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About this book

Barbara Demick spent years digging into what life looks like in Ngaba, a remote Tibetan town inside China's borders. The book follows roughly half a dozen residents whose stories she traces across decades. Monks, traders, students, all caught between Tibetan identity and Beijing's tightening grip.

The title comes from a real moment in 1935, when starving Communist soldiers raided a monastery and ate the offerings made of barley flour shaped like Buddhas. That detail sets the tone. This isn't a sweeping history of Tibet. It's closer to the ground, more about families and small choices than politics from a distance.

If you've read Nothing to Envy, her earlier book about North Korea, the approach will feel familiar. Patient, specific, built from years of conversation.

About the author

Barbara Demick

Barbara Demick is an American journalist. She was the Beijing bureau chief of the Los Angeles Times. She is also known for her books Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea, Eat the Buddha: Life and Death in a Tibetan Town, and Daughters of the Bamboo Grove: China’s Stolen Children and a Story of Separated Twins.

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