Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition, and the Loss of an Extraordinary Mind

Written by a friend and confidante of Iris Chang, this breathtaking book reveals the private woman behind the international celebrity. Iris Chang's mysterious suicide in 2004, at the age of thirty-six didn't seem to make any sense. She had more to live for than most - fame and fortune, beauty, a husband and child. Some even wondered if the controversial author of "The Rape of Nanking" had been murdered.Long-time friend Paula Kamen, whom Iris had called just days before her death, was among those left wondering what had gone so wrong. Seeking to reconcile the suicide with the image of Iris' seemingly 'perfect life', Kamen searched her own memory and scoured Chang's letters, diaries and archival material to fill in the gaps of Chang's transformation - from awkward teen to homecoming princess at college, from 'ex-shy person' to world-class speaker and international human rights pioneer - and later decline into mental illness and paranoia. A literary investigation of an important writer's journey, "Finding Iris" is a tribute to a lost heroine, a portrait of the real and vulnerable woman who inspired so many around the world.