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December 19, 2008
I'm sad I can't find a picture of the book cover to put on here because it is fantastically trashy. It's a naked Chinese woman with big 'ole 1970s hair holding a fan over her naughty bits. Anyway, despite the embarrassing cover, this book was actually really fascinating. It's an on-the-ground, first-person look at the totally insane, decadent, place that was 1930s Shanghai. The author/narrator mentions all these major historical events, political events, well-known figures, and is there walking around in that world actually running into all these people on the street. (He was working as a journalist in Shanghai during this period.) It's all pretty amazing. The part where he and the other foreigners get put into a Japanese prison camp is especially engrossing. Oh and he claims to have once managed to sneak into Chiang Kai-Shek's stronghold and been nodded at by Chiang.
So I actually thought this was great, but this book is basically doomed to never be taken seriously as anything of value because it is unfortunately marketed as a sex book, and so like every 15 pages or so he stops to tell us about some sort of outrageous sexcapade. So the book is punctuated throughout with handjobs at the movies, blowjobs in the alley, threesomes with gay taxi dancers, etc. etc. ad infinitum throughout. Apparently there was one taxi company that would come with a girl and you just specified how long of a drive you wanted and get drive around while this prostitute gave you a blowjob or whatever in the backseat. And he alleges to have visited a Japanese-run entertainment villa with, in addition to the usual opium den and gambling hall, featured a live show with real copulation happening onstage (between an Indian woman and some dude painted all gold to look like some kind of Hindu deity.)
Final note is that the author's voice was also interesting because he kept going out of his way to make a point about how he feels like everyone is equal and racism is stupid, which I suppose put him ahead of his time given that the British during that time were obsessed with maintaining their image as superior to the Chinese locals.
So I actually thought this was great, but this book is basically doomed to never be taken seriously as anything of value because it is unfortunately marketed as a sex book, and so like every 15 pages or so he stops to tell us about some sort of outrageous sexcapade. So the book is punctuated throughout with handjobs at the movies, blowjobs in the alley, threesomes with gay taxi dancers, etc. etc. ad infinitum throughout. Apparently there was one taxi company that would come with a girl and you just specified how long of a drive you wanted and get drive around while this prostitute gave you a blowjob or whatever in the backseat. And he alleges to have visited a Japanese-run entertainment villa with, in addition to the usual opium den and gambling hall, featured a live show with real copulation happening onstage (between an Indian woman and some dude painted all gold to look like some kind of Hindu deity.)
Final note is that the author's voice was also interesting because he kept going out of his way to make a point about how he feels like everyone is equal and racism is stupid, which I suppose put him ahead of his time given that the British during that time were obsessed with maintaining their image as superior to the Chinese locals.
Displaying 1 of 1 review