Imperial China meets Edwardian England in this epic story of loves lost and gained, set during the aftermath of the Opium Wars.
Best friends Jiali and Wu Fang know that no man is a match for them. In their small harbor town of Fudi, they practice sword fighting, write couplets to one another, and strut around dressed as men. Jiali is a renowned poet and Wu Fang is going to be China’s first female surgeon. But when Wu Fang returns from medical training in Japan, she is horrified to hear of Jiali’s marriage to a man who cannot even match her couplets, and confused by her intense feelings of jealousy towards her friend’s new husband, Yanbu.
Ocean man Charles has arrived in Fudi to start a new life. He eschews the company of his fellow foreigners, preferring to spend time with new colleague Yanbu, his wife, Jiali, and her friend, Wu Fang. Over the course of several months, he grows close to them all, in increasingly confusing ways, but what will happen when he is forced to choose between his country and his friends?
As tensions between the Manchu rulers and the people rise, and foreign battleships gather out to sea, loyalties will be tested in more ways than Jiali, Wu Fang, Yanbu, and Charles can possibly imagine.
Praise for Wives of the East Wind:
“A fine combination of delicacy and steeliness … the yin and yang of marriage, Weyna’s barbed relationship with her widowed mother, loyalty misplaced and rediscovered—makes for a warm and understated novel.”
The Guardian
Praise for Wives of the East Wind:
“The simple style of the narrative is perfectly in keeping with the story—a tale of ordinary people who are not ordinary at all. There are moments of humor mixed with great hardship and the characters face their trials with dignity. This is a moving, non-judgemental novel set in China’s recent past.”
Historical Novel Society
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Praise for Wives of the East Wind:
“Epic novel … think fictional Wild Swans.”
Woman and Home
Praise for Startling Moon:
“Fascinating and very sympathetically presented.”
The Independent
Praise for Startling Moon:
’Absolutely extraordinary.’
BBC Radio 4 Open Book
