If you like to escape into books, let me take you through some of South East Asia’s most fascinating and tumultuous years.
Readers may think writers call on our imaginations to create stories that will engage and engross them.
If you are not a brilliant author, then, like me, you know what happened in the past in real life provides more than enough substance. All you need to do is add some interesting characters and make them live through that history.
Mark Twain said, ‘Truth is stranger than fiction, but that is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.’
With some professional help from experts in the USA, I have reissued the first three novels in paperback and Kindle. All the original Amazon reviews from ten years ago have been lost, which was a significant disappointment. So I decided to obtain new reviews with the Online Book Club, which are being received almost daily, and 98% have 5 or 4 stars.
As an example here is the first review I received this year. There are currently over 150 others like it. 50% give it 5 stars, while 49% give it 4 stars. Honest! Test whether I’m telling the truth by looking at Reviews
With these encouraging reviews behind me, I decided to start advertising my series of novels in May 2024, However, a number of awful occurrences have materialised, the worst being a wild fire which devasted thousands of square metres of a range of hilllsides including the home of my son and wife here in Spain, while recently my wife, Jo, broke her collarbone which will require her wearing a sling 24/7 for at least eight weeks, and when she recovers her gallbladder has to be removed in December.
So I haven’t kept my eye on the ball as other priorities take precedence. I will begin promoting my books in January 2025
However to continue. The main characters in these books are fictitious and are woven into actual historical events and life at the time of my novels. Here are just a few of the actual events which will be included in my novels:
- The Japanese army fought their way into Shanghai in August 1937, and four years later, on the same day they attacked Pearl Harbour, they invaded Hong Kong.
- A massive typhoon struck Hong Kong in 1937 and killed 11,000 people.
- British and Canadian soldiers fought the Japanese in Hong Kong; many died, the rest were interned, and some were later sent to work in Japan as slave labour.
- Large triad gangs ran drugs, prostitution, protection and other crimes while taking advantage of widespread corruption in the Government and the police.
- The Colony grew to be a business powerhouse in Southeast Asia, and the trademark ‘Made in Hong Kong’ was born.
- The most dramatic of all, however, was Mao becoming the world’s biggest murderer in history, killing more than Hitler and Stalin combined.
- The decision by China to enforce the hundred-year-old treaty, and repossess Hong Kong, led to a number of conflicts and concerns about the future after 1997.
Some readers may say I have sometimes used violence and some gratuitous sex in my books, but read how Stella Wong describes Shanghai in the introduction to The Shanghai Circle, when that city in the 1930s was called the “Paris of the East” and The Whore of Asia”.
The history of the Chinese Circles is that I wrote the series of three novels in 2012. I issued them as e-books on Amazon but didn’t publicise them, sold over a thousand and then moved onto other things.
One of my daughters, Diana Rosie, became a successful writer, with her novels published by Macmillan’s, and also translated into French, German, Italian and Portuguese. I decided these were my genes shining through! I conveniently set aside the knowledge she was a successful copywriter and used to creating high-quality text.
With more free time, having moved from a 170 year old house in the Spanish hills to an apartment by the sea but just 10 kilometres away, I decided it was a good plan to rewrite the novels, and then act sensibly and look for experienced literary help and guidance.
In other words, do it properly this time. Here I was helped by new American friends – TLC Book Design and Bradley Wind.
All three novels were released in 2023. The Shanghai Circle where in 1936, we meet Davina, a taipan’s daughter, Irina, an impoverished Russian immigrant, and Joseph, the son of a powerful triad leader. Their story begins as the Japanese advance on Shanghai. Then, in the The Hong Kong Circle, my characters having escaped to Hong Kong but face the Japanese again as they attack the British colony in 1941. Most of my characters survive the brutal war years until 1945 when the Japanese surrender after Hiroshima. The Mao Circle, introduces a new character, Yan, who is brought up in China during the harrowing years of Maoism and the Cultural Revolution while Hong Kong recovers from the war to become a dominant economic power.
I have started to write the fourth novel, The 1997 Circle, which will bring the surviving descendants of my original characters through to 1997 which sees the end of Hong Kong’s days as a British colony. My connection to this enigmatic part of the world, where I spent ten years, is explained on my Author page. This means I will have covered 60 years in the four books. So much has happened in that period in Hong Kong and China, so never a shortage of actual events to describe.
The children of the people introduced in The Shanghai Circle will need to tackle the challenges which are thrown at them as Hong Kong moves back towards being under communist control. It is now over 26 years since 1997, and Hong Kong has not been an easy time for the local people. Worse, month by month, the future looks increasingly depressing. So if I do write my fifth novel, it will be called The Final Circle, and it will bring my remaining characters from 1997 through to the 2020s and paint how Hong Kong is coping in today’s world.
Tony
October 2024
You are welcome to contact me by using the form on the contact page.