Book Riot Read Harder Challenge #2: Read a childhood favorite book.

I came out of the womb a history nerd. Learning more about different places, peoples, and cultures is one of my absolutely favorite things. This is one of the main reasons I loved this series so much as a kid.

This series, The Royal Diaries, follows the lives of real royal young women from around the world through fictional versions of their diaries. I read and reread all of the books in this series. But when it came to this challenge, this book set in southern China in 531 A.D. was the first that came to mind.

It follows the story of the Lady of Ch’iao Kuo, also known as Princess Redbird. She was the daughter of a chieftain in southern China. Her older brother became chieftain and was not exactly the best ruler. The people eventually asked her to rule instead. She, most likely, would have still been a teenager during this time.

She was so respected that her people, the Hsien, wanted her to be in charge. By all accounts, she was a great ruler who was both wise and fair. Together with her husband, the son of a Chinese general, she brought law and order to the region. The official Chinese histories, which were mostly focused on the emperors, have almost four pages dedicated to her.

It is estimated that she died around 601 A.D., which, based on the author’s estimation of her birth year as 516 A.D., means she lived to be around 85 years old. And she ruled the region for most of that time.

Because she lived so long ago, we do not have a ton of information on her life. What we do have, however, makes it clear that she was a pretty awesome lady.

So not only should you read this book, but you should also go down a googling rabbit hole to learn more about her.