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House of Books
My husband and I live in a library. We have books on all four floors, in the hallways and along the stairs, in every room of the house. Since my husband and I are both writers, we have plenty of piles, too. Books to read, to sell, to use in the writing of yet more…
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Jiaozi
I love jiaozi. It’s what I want to eat when I go home to Los Angeles. It’s the first stop if I’m traveling in Asia, whether that’s Kyoto (where they’re called gyoza), Taipei or Shanghai. For me, jiaozi is comfort food. But at least one website breathlessly declares jiaozi to be: at the heart and…
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Say It Ain’t So, Joe
The 1919 World Series pitted the Cincinnati Reds against the Chicago White Sox. The Sox were heavily favored to win but lost 5:10. Rumors soon circulated that players like “Shoeless” Joe Jackson threw the games. The ensuing Black Sox Scandal resulted in a grand jury indictment of Shoeless Joe, 7 other White Sox players and…
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Mind Map
This is the map into my interlocking novels, The Shanghai Quartet. It’s a bulletin board my husband made for me, 6 feet wide and 4 feet tall. The backdrop is a map of modern Shanghai, enlarged many times over, onto which I’ve pasted the street names in use when this was Old Shanghai. Onto that…
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Day of the Dead
Every culture has a tradition of honoring the dead. It may be grave sweeping in China or the Obon festival in Japan. On All Souls Day here in Amsterdam, families set candle-lit boots loose onto the lake in Vondelpark to send messages to departed loved ones. History is another way to remember the dead. It’s…
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Laogai
Laogai will be the third volume of The Shanghai Quartet and its star will be Song Kang. We first see Kang in The Dancing Girl and the Turtle as the returned student, the prodigal son, called back from America to care for his ailing sister Anyi. Eighteen years later, we meet him again. He’s in…
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Shanghai Noir
Today I lay my claim to Shanghai Noir. You could use the term for a film genre, a literary tradition or a thriller set in Old Shanghai. Sounds like my debut novel The Dancing Girl and the Turtle. My novel tells the story of Song Anyi. She’s a rebellious young woman. Soldiers rape and leave…
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Ghost Month
Throughout Asia, Ghost Month is the moment to commemorate the dead. A good reason to think about ghosts and why they appear in my novel, The Dancing Girl and the Turtle. Ancestor worship My novel takes place in Shanghai 1937. Think big band and the foxtrot, opium dens and ballroom dancing. All that jazz as China…
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Genesis of a Quartet
Since the publication of The Dancing Girl and the Turtle, people keep asking me: what’s next? They’re astonished to hear that I’ve got 3 more novels in the works. It’s all part of my master plan to complete The Shanghai Quartet. Was that the idea all along? Far from it. plotters and pantsers In 2011,…