19 July 2012

Mainland mothers in Hong Kong

2016-11-24T01:14:14+08:00July 19th, 2012|book excerpt, china, hong kong|9 Comments

The issue of mainland Chinese mothers coming to Hong Kong to give birth is much in the news lately, with some people hoping new chief executive Leung Chun-ying will take steps to limit the number of beds available to mainland mothers. I thought it was a good time to excerpt this story from Yeeshan Yang’s book Whispers and Moans — [...]

22 March 2012

A story of Fries and Mayo

2016-11-24T01:14:19+08:00March 22nd, 2012|book excerpt, china|1 Comment

A guest blog post from business veteran Jack Leblanc, whose entertaining book Business Republic of China is now available on Kindle, Nook and other e-readers! *   *   * Once upon a time Mr. Mayo, a smart businessman who headed a three-generation-old European company producing deep-frozen French Fries and other iced delicacies, decided that the time was ripe to head for [...]

15 August 2011

Eating Smoke hits the shops — now watch the book trailer!

2016-11-24T01:14:22+08:00August 15th, 2011|authors, book excerpt, hong kong, new books|3 Comments

Chris Thrall's Eating Smoke, his memoir of a wild year spent in the gritty underbelly of Hong Kong -- a true story of drugs, crime and psychosis --  is now on the shelves of local bookshops! Chris Thrall left the Royal Marines to find his fortune in Hong Kong, but instead found himself homeless and hooked on crystal meth. Soon [...]

24 January 2011

Book excerpt: With Bare Hands by Alain Robert

2016-11-24T01:14:26+08:00January 24th, 2011|authors, book excerpt, events|0 Comments

Extreme urban climber Alain Robert is in Hong Kong this week to give a talk at the Royal Geographical Society (6:30pm, Tuesday Jan 25th, details at the link). This reminds me to post an excerpt from his hair-raising autobiography With Bare Hands. Alain has made a career out of thumbing his nose at the authorities and doing what people tell [...]

5 October 2010

Book excerpt: Apologies Forthcoming — Stories not about Mao

2016-11-24T01:14:29+08:00October 5th, 2010|authors, book excerpt, china|0 Comments

We don’t publish a lot of fiction — it’s hard to compete in the marketplace with the big names — but occasionally we find an author with a set of stories so relevant we have to go with it. Such was the case with Xujun Eberlein’s Apologies Forthcoming, a collection of short stories set in and around China’s Cultural Revolution. [...]

31 March 2010

Book excerpt: Starting from Scrap

2016-11-24T01:14:34+08:00March 31st, 2010|authors, book excerpt, media attention, new books|3 Comments

Stephen Greer’s new Asia business memoir Starting from Scrap has just been reviewed in the Wall Street Journal. Greer arrived in Hong Kong in 1993, a recent college grad with no financing, scant experience, and only a notion of starting some kind of business. Fourteen years later, his company Hartwell Pacific was a $250-million enterprise and a player in the [...]

28 March 2010

Wang Jingwei: traitor or hero?

2022-11-07T00:25:59+08:00March 28th, 2010|book excerpt, china, hong kong, media attention|5 Comments

There’s an interesting article in today’s Sunday Morning Post about Wang Jingwei, the wartime Chinese leader who collaborated with the Japanese to set up a puppet government in Nanjing, and who has been reviled by Chinese ever since as a traitor. Indeed, his very name carries the same derogatory associations as ‘Quisling’ in the West. It seems that Wang’s calligraphy [...]

2 March 2010

Book excerpt: The Great Walk of China

2022-11-07T00:26:19+08:00March 2nd, 2010|book excerpt, china, hiking, new books|1 Comment

In advance of Graham Earnshaw’s talk at the Beijing Bookworm on Saturday, here’s a chapter from his brand new book, The Great Walk of China. After crossing flat country for most of the distance from Shanghai, Graham finds himself in the Dabie Mountains of rural Anhui Province. Chapter 2: Drinking Games The day’s walk was over and I returned to [...]

28 February 2010

Book excerpt: Saudi Match Point

2022-07-22T23:55:51+08:00February 28th, 2010|book excerpt|0 Comments

With students at Chinese colleges accused this month of conducting cyber attacks on US businesses in and outside China, plus the alleged Mossad involvement in the assassination of a Hamas leader in Dubai, I’m reminded of Paul Ulrich’s spy thriller Saudi Match Point, in which Chinese and American spies compete to seize control of the Saudi oilfields. An excerpt below. [...]

15 January 2010

Book preview: Waiting for the Dalai Lama

2016-11-24T01:14:40+08:00January 15th, 2010|book excerpt, china, new books|6 Comments

Can common ground be found on the divisive issue of Tibet? First, it’s necessary to find out what the people involved think, and why. Chinese-speaking journalist Annelie Rozeboom worked as a foreign correspondent in China for ten years. During that time she was able to interview numerous Tibetan people inside and outside Tibet, as well as Chinese and Western observers [...]

21 December 2009

Diamond Hill reviewed

2017-10-05T20:03:29+08:00December 21st, 2009|book excerpt, hong kong, media attention|0 Comments

Feng Chi-shun's Kowloon memoir Diamond Hill has been in the shops for a few weeks and has gained good reviews in the South China Morning Post, Time Out Hong Kong, Cairns Media Magazine and now The Correspondent, whose reviewer writes "The book finishes only to leave the reader wanting more -- it's a good read." Click on the following link [...]

30 June 2009

China: Portrait of a People — a lesson in how to travel

2009-06-30T02:36:27+08:00June 30th, 2009|authors, book excerpt, china|10 Comments

Some years ago now, I crossed the border from Kazakhstan into Xinjiang in China's far northwest, and found myself stuck in Urumchi with the equivalent of US$50 and no onward tickets. It wasn't a problem; saving my cash for food, I 'hitch-hiked' on China's trains by boarding them at small-town stations and then jumping off before the ticket collectors reached [...]