I recently reviewed Nancy Shatzman Steinhardt, China’s Early Mosques (Edinburgh University Press, 2015) for Religious Studies Review.

Here is a sneak peak:

The greatest strength is Steinhardt’s ability to bring her expertise in Chinese architecture to the Islamic domain. Chinese buildings share fundamental principles that govern placement and aesthetic construction, such as courtyards, gates, purposeful orientation in direction, and polychromatic facades. Steinhardt demonstrates how Muslims most often followed these traditional standards but adapted them for their own purposes making an organic Chinese Islamic architectural system. The book will be the definitive text for the foreseeable future.