Using Nyonya beadwork as both a lens and an object of study, Hwei-Fe'n Cheah explores historical, social and cultural transformations in the Peranakan Chinese community. Phoenix Rising provides social scientists with tangible tools for examining concepts of modernity and tradition. For gender theorists, Phoenix Rising exemplifies the way time was used for beadwork and embroidery, thus crafting notions of Nyonya culture and identity. The reader is simultaneously taken on two journeys, the one pictorial, the other analytic, to learn about the changing ways in which meaning intersects with items of material culture---historically and currently. The combination is a visually and intellectually exciting example of multi-disciplinary research that is also aesthetically stunning. Barbara Leigh Adjunct Professor, University of Technology Sydney --