{
"item_title" : "Shanghai",
"item_author" : [" Joseph Kanon "],
"item_description" : "A steamy, thrilling crime story (The Washington Post) from New York Times bestselling author Joseph Kanon set in pre-World War II Shanghai, where glamour and squalor exist side by side and murder is just the cost of doing business. After the violence of Kristallnacht (1938), European Jews, now desperate to emigrate, found the consular doors of the world closed to them. Only one port required no entry visa: Shanghai, a self-governing Western trading enclave in what was technically Chinese territory, a political anomaly that became an escape hatch--if you were lucky enough to afford a ticket on one of the great Lloyd liners sailing to the East and safety. Daniel Lohr was one of the lucky ones--lucky enough to have escaped the Gestapo when his colleagues in the resistance were caught, lucky to have an uncle waiting in Shanghai, lucky to find a casual shipboard flirtation that turns unexpectedly passionate. But even lucky refugees have to confront the reality of Shanghai. With all their assets and passports confiscated by the Nazis, they arrive penniless and stateless in a tumultuous, nearly lawless city notorious for vice. When you can sink fast, how far are you willing to go to survive? What lines do you cross? As Daniel tries to navigate his way through his uncle's world in Shanghai's fabled nightlife, he finds himself increasingly ensnared in a maze where politics and crime are two sides of the same shiny coin. The trick, his uncle tells him, is to stay one step ahead. But how do you stay ahead of murder? How do you outrun your own past? A Casablanca-worthy setting for World War II-era intrigue (Parade), Shanghai is the story of a political haven that becomes a minefield of conflicting loyalties--one of [Kanon's] most satisfying historical thrillers to date (The Wall Street Journal).",
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"A steamy, thrilling crime story" (The Washington Post) from New York Times bestselling author Joseph Kanon set in pre-World War II Shanghai, where glamour and squalor exist side by side and murder is just the cost of doing business. After the violence of Kristallnacht (1938), European Jews, now desperate to emigrate, found the consular doors of the world closed to them. Only one port required no entry visa: Shanghai, a self-governing Western trading enclave in what was technically Chinese territory, a political anomaly that became an escape hatch--if you were lucky enough to afford a ticket on one of the great Lloyd liners sailing to the East and safety. Daniel Lohr was one of the lucky ones--lucky enough to have escaped the Gestapo when his colleagues in the resistance were caught, lucky to have an uncle waiting in Shanghai, lucky to find a casual shipboard flirtation that turns unexpectedly passionate. But even lucky refugees have to confront the reality of Shanghai. With all their assets and passports confiscated by the Nazis, they arrive penniless and stateless in a tumultuous, nearly lawless city notorious for vice. When you can sink fast, how far are you willing to go to survive? What lines do you cross? As Daniel tries to navigate his way through his uncle's world in Shanghai's fabled nightlife, he finds himself increasingly ensnared in a maze where politics and crime are two sides of the same shiny coin. The trick, his uncle tells him, is to stay one step ahead. But how do you stay ahead of murder? How do you outrun your own past? "A Casablanca-worthy setting for World War II-era intrigue" (Parade), Shanghai is the story of a political haven that becomes a minefield of conflicting loyalties--"one of [Kanon's] most satisfying historical thrillers to date" (The Wall Street Journal).
Internationally bestselling author and Edgar Award-winner Joseph Kanon is known for his elegantly written, impressively immersive World War II thrillers, and Shanghai is no exception.
In his fascinating and tautly suspenseful 11th novel, the author transports readers to 1939 Shanghai, where his characters, still reeling from Kristallnacht, are seeking safety in the only port city that doesn’t require a visa (and which ultimately offered a haven to some 20,000 European Jewish refugees during WWII).
As the story begins, Daniel Lohr, a German Jew, is traveling first class on the SS Raffaello, a luxury liner departing from Italy. So is Leah Auerbach, as well as hundreds of other Jewish passengers seeking a new start after the world they knew crumbled around them. When the ship first left shore, “For a second [Daniel] felt a stab of panic, no country, no money, but then as the boat began to slide away relief swept through him. Europe was going to destroy itself and he’d escaped.”
While at sea, Daniel and Leah disappear into a passionate love affair that helps them push aside their pain and grief. But reality knocks in the form of their menacing fellow passenger Colonel Yamada, a higher-up in the Nazi-allied Japanese military police occupying Shanghai, as well as Leah’s conviction that survival in the metropolis is not assured. Daniel’s fate is more assured than most, though: His uncle Nathan, a jazz club and casino owner, has guaranteed him work and lodging in his new city.
Alas, while Nathan is charming and clever, he’s also heavily involved in the criminal underworld, and Daniel soon finds himself contending with gang violence and wrestling with his uneasy moral compass. As he gains power in Shanghai, is he losing himself? Sure, as Uncle Nathan says, “The first rule was to survive,” but at what cost?
Kanon conjures up the city’s veneer of glamour, and the danger and desperation festering beneath, with his trademark skill and verve. Shanghai artfully balances violence, romance and edgy suspense in a layered and compelling tale of an extraordinary place and time in human history.
