“I don’t think she cares how fat her ankles get. Do you know how much she inherited when her father died? I heard she and her five brothers got seven hundred million each." When a novel begins with a woman and her children being turned away from a fancy hotel and she’s so upset her husband buys the hotel that same night, you can count me in. Kevin Kwan doesn’t miss ... Read More...
The Bathing Women
In a family with dignity, there was no room for “other things”, no matter how profoundly someone in this family was shamed, or how deeply the person suffered. The Bathing Women takes place from the mid-1960s to present day in the city of Fuan, China. It begins with the sisters, Tiao and Fan, being left in a small apartment by their parents, Wu and Yixun, who have been ... Read More...
The Headmaster’s Wager
In 1930 Percival Chen’s father left him and his mother in mainland China to go to Vietnam and seek his fortune. He never returned and so, after his mother’s death, Percival left their province to go to school in Hong Kong. Unfortunately, the Japanese invasion in 1941 meant that Hong Kong was no longer safe, but it precipitated Percival’s marriage to a young beauty much above ... Read More...
