The author of the hugely fun & hugely successful “Crazy Rich Asians” has a new book out, and it makes for a happy, escapist read in these dire Covid-19 times. Though the central characters are of Asian descent or are Asian, the action takes place in Capri in 2013 and, …
This book is the 7th in the wonderful Inspector Chen series, and is quite different from the previous books in that most of the action takes place away from Shanghai, a city which is otherwise an integral part of the whole wonderful persona of the charming, honest, poetry loving, slightly …
I am not sure at which point enthusiasm becomes embarrassing, but I’m going to risk it anyway. In Shanghai last week to visit my son who works there, I re-read all the Inspector Chen novels with great pleasure. As I have said before in other book reviews, there is nothing …
The problem with Kindle Singles is that I devour them far too quickly, and promptly end up wanting more. Such was the case with “Villanelle : Shanghai,” the third in this gripping series about a beautiful killing machine. Codename Villanelle. Set in Shanghai, where – great fun – I am headed …
It was my son’s moving to Shanghai with his job that prompted my fearsomely well-read sister to recommend the Chief Inspector Chen mysteries, and having just concluded the third in the series, back to back, I am beyond hooked. And as soon as I have written my reviews, I …
Before I even start writing the review – disclosure time. I am in book club in Delhi with the author’s wife, Theo. So I am not totally impartial, especially since we were all privy to some of the labour pains involved in the final stages of this fascinating book. I …
This slim, charming novel about one of the darkest periods in recent Chinese history, the Cultural Revolution, manages to combine ugliness and brutishness with a life-saving thread of hope and young love and dreams. It is 1971, and 2 young men, teenaged sons of then-reviled intellectuals, are sent off to …
