'This is the first comprehensive book to offer an invaluable review on the social history of China during the period of Chinese inconsistency and chaos. The author, through a detailed sociological approach, has successfully identified social forces that finally won the civil war for the leadership of China's Communist Party … This book is then one of the best studies addressing China's civil war; its reading is therefore recommended to specialists in Chinese studies and sinologists.' Ghasem Torabi, Europe-Asia Studies

China's Civil War is the first book of its kind to offer a social history in English of the Civil War in 1945–9 that brought the Chinese Communist Party to power. Integrating history and memory, it surveys a period of intense upheaval and chaos to show how the Communist Party and its armies succeeded in overthrowing the Nationalist government to bring political and social revolution to China. Drawing from a collection of biographies, memoirs, illustrations and oral histories, Diana Lary gives a voice to those who experienced the war first-hand, exemplifying the direct effects of warfare - the separations and divisions, the exiles and losses, and the social upheaval that resulted from the conflict. Lary explores the long-term impact on Chinese societies on the Mainland, Taiwan and Hong Kong, which have all diverged far from pre-war Chinese society.

Introduction
1. The social background to the Civil War
2. Ending one war, beginning another: August 1945–June 1946
3. Turning points: July 1946–June 1947
4. All-out war: July 1947–June 1948
5. Nearing the end: July 1948–January 1949
6. The end game: February to December, 1949
7. The immediate outcome: the early 1950s
8. Social outcomes of the Civil War
Conclusion
Index.

Subject Areas: 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000 [HBLW], Asian history [HBJF]