JADE PHOENIX, the award-winning novel about Taiwan by former diplomat and ITASA Keynote Speaker Syd Goldsmith, has just been published in a Far East edition by Bookman, the most respected publisher in Taiwan. Bookman, and the reviewers of both the US and the Far East editions have called this very important book about Taiwan, "a marvelous collage of history, politics, mystery and romance."

The author wrote us this letter from Taipei, addressed to all members.

Dear ITASA Members,

A weekend with ITASA students at Yale convinced me that the future of the Taiwanese is in your hands, no matter where you wish to make your lives.

My own future has been mostly in Taipei , Taichung and Kaohsiung ever since 1968. Shortly after the Yale Conference I set out seeking the soul of Taiwan, to better understand the extraordinary people I had come to know here over more than twenty years as a diplomat, entrepreneur, and musician. As the Taiwanese political officer in the U.S. Embassy 1970-1974, and the Director of AIT Kaohsiung from 1985-1989, I came to know many of those in your grandparents' and parents' generations who struggled, went to prison, and risked even their lives to finally win Taiwan's democracy.

JADE PHOENIX is the story of a Taiwan that even present-day college students here can hardly imagine; because most of their parents and grandparents never talk about how hard life was when they were your age. The story needs to be told, because their past will enrich your future.

I hope you will read this novel, because this is your heritage, and the essence of the Taiwanese-American relationship, personal as well as political. Equally important, I hope you will persuade Americans you know to read JADE PHOENIX. It is long past time that Americans came to understand Taiwan , what the Taiwanese stand for, and why you are so important to the US.