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Last Boat Out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao's Revolution Paperback – February 18, 2020
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“A true page-turner . . . [Helen] Zia has proven once again that history is something that happens to real people.”—New York Times bestselling author Lisa See
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY NPR AND THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR • FINALIST FOR THE PEN/JACQUELINE BOGRAD WELD AWARD FOR BIOGRAPHY
Shanghai has historically been China’s jewel, its richest, most modern and westernized city. The bustling metropolis was home to sophisticated intellectuals, entrepreneurs, and a thriving middle class when Mao’s proletarian revolution emerged victorious from the long civil war. Terrified of the horrors the Communists would wreak upon their lives, citizens of Shanghai who could afford to fled in every direction. Seventy years later, members of the last generation to fully recall this massive exodus have revealed their stories to Chinese American journalist Helen Zia, who interviewed hundreds of exiles about their journey through one of the most tumultuous events of the twentieth century. From these moving accounts, Zia weaves together the stories of four young Shanghai residents who wrestled with the decision to abandon everything for an uncertain life as refugees in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the United States.
Benny, who as a teenager became the unwilling heir to his father’s dark wartime legacy, must decide either to escape to Hong Kong or navigate the intricacies of a newly Communist China. The resolute Annuo, forced to flee her home with her father, a defeated Nationalist official, becomes an unwelcome exile in Taiwan. The financially strapped Ho fights deportation from the U.S. in order to continue his studies while his family struggles at home. And Bing, given away by her poor parents, faces the prospect of a new life among strangers in America. The lives of these men and women are marvelously portrayed, revealing the dignity and triumph of personal survival.
Herself the daughter of immigrants from China, Zia is uniquely equipped to explain how crises like the Shanghai transition affect children and their families, students and their futures, and, ultimately, the way we see ourselves and those around us. Last Boat Out of Shanghai brings a poignant personal angle to the experiences of refugees then and, by extension, today.
“Zia’s portraits are compassionate and heartbreaking, and they are, ultimately, the universal story of many families who leave their homeland as refugees and find less-than-welcoming circumstances on the other side.”—Amy Tan, author of The Joy Luck Club
- Print length544 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherBallantine Books
- Publication dateFebruary 18, 2020
- Dimensions5.19 x 1.16 x 8 inches
- ISBN-100345522338
- ISBN-13978-0345522337
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Editorial Reviews
Review
“A deftly woven, deeply moving chronicle of the extraordinary ordeals of four ordinary Chinese in a world torn by war and fractured by ideology . . . a fascinating read as an intimate family memoir, as well as a missing chapter of modern history finally coming to light . . . What makes the Shanghai story unique . . . is that we didn’t really know the story. Except in some films and novels that make passing references to this episode of Chinese history—often as a nostalgic backdrop, equivalent to a crowd scene in cinematic terms—the real human cost of the massive exodus has remained a mystery. Official records, if any, are suppressed, and research in this area has been sketchy. In this sense, Helen Zia’s new book, Last Boat Out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Fled Mao’s Revolution . . . fills a gap in our collective memory.”—San Francisco Chronicle
“Beautifully crafted, carefully researched . . . Last Boat Out of Shanghai is an engaging work of high-quality popular history. It has things to offer not just to general readers with little knowledge about the city’s intriguing past, but even to specialists. . . . Ms. Zia lets us eavesdrop on the conversations in ‘hushed voices’ of several people whose childhoods are brought vividly to life. . . . Last Boat Out of Shanghai is so good I’ll certainly need to add it to the syllabus for my class. That means something else will have to go—or my students will simply have four hundred more pages of fascinating reading.”—Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom, The Wall Street Journal
“The dramatic story of four young people who were among the thousands fleeing China after 1949’s Communist revolution. Eye-opening.”—People
“Zia’s portraits are compassionate and heartbreaking, and they are, ultimately, the universal story of many families who leave their homeland as refugees and find less-than-welcoming circumstances on the other side. I read with a personal hunger to know the political and personal exigencies that led to those now-or-never decisions, for they mirror the story of my own mother, who also left on virtually the last boat out of Shanghai.”—Amy Tan, author of The Joy Luck Club
“I have long been an admirer of Helen Zia’s writing and scholarship, but Last Boat Out of Shanghai is at a whole new level. It’s a true page-turner. Zia has proven once again that history is something that happens to real people. I stayed up late reading night after night, because I wanted to know what would happen to Benny, Ho, Bing, Annuo, and their friends and families.”—Lisa See, author of The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane
About the Author
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Benny
Age 9
Shanghai, August 14, 1937
Racing north on the treelined French concession side of Avenue Haig, a nimble boy weaved his way around the sidewalk’s throngs, dodging ahead of basket-laden shoppers and old men out for an afternoon stroll. He barely glanced at the hawkers with their motley goods spread out on the pavement or the threadbare beggars cross-legged on the hard ground, their bony hands extended to passersby for some pity and a coin.
With his unruly black hair, his knee socks bunched at the ankles, and the tail of his white shirt climbing out of his short pants, there was still no mistaking this child for a street urchin making off with something pilfered. Benny Pan was lithe and strong, his skin fair and his cheeks ruddy with a healthy glow. More telling was his open, confident manner, his eyes wide without a trace of guile. He could have been any child of the city’s sizable middle class of professionals and service workers who tended to the giant metropolis. He might have even been a scion of Shanghai’s bourgeoisie, the newly rich Chinese capitalists who had taken over the sectors of industry and commerce not already controlled by the foreigners. Or, most exclusive of all, his family could have been compradors, the Chinese who served as trusted go-betweens for the rich and powerful foreign taipans, the European and American empire builders whose vast wealth derived from the opium trade. In return for being their agents, the compradors were richly rewarded with the money and access to power that were held only by the foreigners in treaty port cities like Shanghai, concessions established after China failed in its effort to halt the opium traffic.
For this privileged child of Shanghai, the broad expanse of Avenue Haig was a playground. Its wide, curving lanes formed the western border of the French Concession, where he lived. He could ride his bike northward on the avenue into the British-run International Settlement to the elite American missionary institutions: McTyeire School, St. John’s University, and St. Mary’s Hall; his parents had attended the latter two and expected him to study at St. John’s one day. A mile to the south was St. Ignatius Cathedral and its towering spires.
Benny had explored all points of interest on the east side of Avenue Haig. He was forbidden, however, to cross to the west side of that border street, an area of contested jurisdiction. Shanghai’s foreign settlements stood as virtual islands inside China’s sovereign territory, allowed to rule themselves with foreign laws—an arrangement forced upon China by the British and Americans after their “gunboat diplomacy” defeated the Qing dynasty emperor in the Opium Wars of the mid-1800s. Though the boundaries of the foreign-ruled enclaves were clearly delimited by treaty, over the years the British had continued to push out roads, country estates, luxurious villas, schools, country clubs, hunting grounds, and a racetrack beyond the border and into the “extra-boundary” or “extra-settlement” areas, all against China’s objections. In this zone of ambiguous jurisdiction, gambling houses, opium dens, brothels, and gangsters also flourished, just out of reach of British or French police. The area was so lawless and dangerous that it was known to locals as the Badlands. Benny’s father forbade the boy to cross Avenue Haig into the crime-ridden Badlands.
On rare occasions, Benny accompanied his father, an accountant and officer in the police auxiliary, into those nether reaches. At such times Benny saw for himself the stark conditions of the Chinese sections: dilapidated shacks and squalid tenements reeking of raw sewage and general decay, overcrowded with people in tattered clothing who navigated the unpaved lanes in rope sandals or bare feet. These were the city’s laboring people, who toiled in the factories and carried the backbreaking loads, pulling the rickshaws, carts, and pedicabs. But at least they had roofs over their heads, his father would note, unlike the homeless beggars and refugees forced to sleep in any vacant patch they could find. Boys like Benny could be kidnapped for ransom—or worse—in those dangerous areas, his parents sternly cautioned.
They needn’t have worried, for Benny was not the sort to defy his parents’ wishes. He found plenty to keep himself occupied in his neighborhood on the east side of Avenue Haig, where the extremes of Shanghai society collided in curious ways. With two hospitals nearby, afflicted and frightening-looking unfortunates lingered on the sidewalks each day, hoping to be treated before they expired. None of that was shocking to Benny. After all, his amah had taught him from the moment he could walk, “If you see a dead body on the street, just go the other way.” That was a simple rule of self-preservation in this unforgiving metropolis where abject misery coexisted with unabashed opulence.
On this day, Benny noticed something different in the usual assemblage of deformity and disease lined up at one of the hospitals. Several people had fresh wounds to their heads and faces or bloodied rags wrapped around twisted or missing limbs. Startled, he realized they might be casualties from the battle with Japan that had begun the day before on the north side of the city in Zhabei, a Chinese section. At any other time, his curiosity might have slowed him for a better look. But he was in too much of a rush to get home: He had to tell his mother what he had just seen in the sky.
As Benny approached a busy intersection, a tall, bearded police officer standing in a kiosk above the street raised his baton, forcing the boy and the traffic to an abrupt halt. “Phooey,” he declared in the American accent that he had learned at school. The swarthy, bearded cop wore a standard-issue khaki police uniform—topped by a telltale red turban. He was a Sikh, one of a few hundred warriors that the British brought from their India colony to be cops in Shanghai. Hong du ah sei—red-hatted monkey—was the disparaging name that local Shanghainese gave these fierce Sikhs.
Near Benny, some pedicab drivers and their well-dressed foreign passengers pulled to a stop. The sick and infirm nearest the foreigners thrust their hands out for alms. One was a boy about his own age with no legs, only stumps, while an old woman had just one eye. Benny knew instantly that the foreigners must be longtimers in Shanghai since no one flinched or displayed even the slightest dismay at the appalling humanity beside them.
When the red-hatted traffic cop finally waved them on, Benny spied a fox pelt on the shoulders of one of the yellow-haired women. Its glass-eyed head bounced with each lurch of the pedicab before disappearing through the gates of the German country club off Avenue Haig. As the little fox head bobbled out of sight, Benny’s eye caught something else: a red band adorned with a black swastika on the arm of a pale-faced foreigner in one of the pedicabs. He recognized the symbol from the flags that were cropping up with greater frequency on the German buildings in his neighborhood. To the boy, it was just another foreign curiosity in his international city.
Soon he reached the gate leading to his neighborhood, the Dasheng lilong, a Shanghai-style enclosed residential complex that was popular with both foreigners and well-to-do Chinese. Just outside the gate, the proprietor of his favorite bookstall called out to him: “Benny, come have a look!” The boy raised an arm in greeting without pausing for his customary scan of the latest magazines and comic books. Turning, he nearly slammed into an old man whose heavy baskets of neatly stacked bitter melons dangled from the pole that he balanced on one shoulder.
“Damn you, little devil,” he snarled.
By then Benny had already mumbled, “Excuse me” as he passed by the heavy iron gate and dozing watchman into the narrow lanes of his lilong. He stopped only after reaching the thick green door of a three-story building attached to its neighbors on each side.
Once inside the mosaic-tiled vestibule, he shouted: “Mother! Amah! The Japanese are coming!”
“Young Master, be quiet or you’ll wake Little Brother and Little Sister!” his amah scolded.
A slender woman appeared from behind a polished wood-paneled door. Her movement was so graceful that the air seemed undisturbed by her approach. As usual, she looked impeccable in a stylish qipao dress, with her hair knotted in a neat chignon. “Long-Long, what are you so excited about?” she asked with a puzzled look. She addressed the boy by his nickname, Little Dragon, chosen because he was born in 1928, during the Year of the Dragon, the most powerful creature of the Chinese zodiac.
“I saw them, Mother. I saw the planes! The Japanese planes are flying to the Waitan!” he shouted, referring to the famous Bund by its Chinese name.
His mother gently brushed the hair from his face with her fingers. Before she could reply, an unmistakable boom shook the quiet of the house. “See, Mother? Let’s go look from the roof!” He was already dashing up the three flights of stairs, his mother not far behind. As they climbed, they could hear another loud boom in the distance. On the roof, they ducked under the drying laundry to reach the open patio where fragrant gardenias and peonies bloomed in large pots. Toward the east, plumes of black smoke rose above the cityscape near the tall Broadway Mansions, a clear landmark.
“The Japanese must be bombing Zhabei, just like on 1-2-8!” he ventured, using the colloquial shorthand for the date January 28, 1932, which was seared into the minds of schoolchildren and grown-ups alike because of the infamous Japanese attack on Shanghai that day, just five years earlier.
Throughout the country, Chinese were seething with outrage at Japan’s most recent aggressions. Their island neighbor had launched numerous “incidents”—as Tokyo euphemistically called their incursions on Chinese soil—each bolder than the last. In 1931 Japan had invaded Manchuria, with its rich coal and mineral reserves, in China’s northeast, locking in its control after installing a puppet government with Puyi, the deposed last emperor of China, to be the region’s figurehead ruler. Such puppets would become Japan’s model for occupation in China.
The Chinese Nationalist government had protested these incidents at the League of Nations to no avail. Just one month earlier, on July 7, 1937, Japan had staged another aggression—this time in Beijing at Lukouqiao, known to Westerners as the Marco Polo Bridge. Frustrated Chinese leaders had been calling on Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek to respond decisively to Japan in a united front that included the Communists. But instead of confronting Japan, he seemed focused on eliminating the Reds. Only the year before, in 1936, one of Chiang’s own generals had precipitated a national crisis by kidnapping him, to force the generalissimo to stand up to Japan. Finally, after this latest provocation in Beijing, Chiang’s army was fighting back—with Shanghai as the battleground.
Just beyond the gates of his lilong, Benny could hear newspaper hawkers barking out the latest headlines each day. Usually, he paid them no mind, letting their voices blend into the din. But in recent weeks, more than three hundred thousand Nationalist soldiers had been mobilized to the countryside surrounding Shanghai. Young boys like Benny who lived in the protected foreign enclaves with little fear of attack were thrilled at the prospect of soldiers, weaponry, and the coming showdown.
This new battle for Shanghai had been launched only the day before, on Friday, August 13, 1937. The sound of distant artillery reverberated through the city. Could it be that Japan was mounting an air attack on Shanghai? That would explain the low-flying aircraft.
Five years earlier, many residents in the foreign concessions had watched from their rooftops as that previous battle with Japan had raged in the nearby Chinese sections. Mesmerized, they had oohed and aahed at the glowing cannon fire and ensuing infernos as though they were spectators at the races. This time would be no different—or so everyone thought. After all, the French consul still ruled the French Concession, and the British and Americans governed the International Settlement through the Shanghai Municipal Council. In addition to the British, Americans, and French, there were tens of thousands of foreigners from nearly every European country living in these two jurisdictions, as well as thousands of Japanese civilians. No one imagined that the Tokyo government would want to fight Britain or America or that it would risk killing off its own nationals living in Shanghai. That’s why Chinese from surrounding areas habitually ran to the foreign concessions in troubled times and why families like Benny’s who could afford to live anywhere chose to live among Shanghai’s many foreigners.
From their rooftop, Benny’s mother gazed out toward the billowing smoke and nearby landmarks. Her face turned pale. “Oh no, Long-Long! Those fires aren’t in Zhabei. They’re inside the International Settlement!”
Around them, other rooftop patios were filling with people, all straining for a glimpse. Someone shouted, “The Waitan has been bombed. Smoke is rising from the Cathay Hotel!” The pyramid-shaped copper roof of the ten-story hotel was the showpiece of Victor Sassoon, one of Shanghai’s most prominent Jewish businessmen. A stunned murmur of disbelief arose from the observers—the presumed shield over the foreign concessions had been shattered.
As they watched intently, another small plane appeared. A man with binoculars on a nearby building suddenly shouted, “Those planes have Chinese insignia on their sides—the blue, red, and white of the Republic of China! They’re our planes, not Japan’s!” The onlookers gasped as more bombs fell, their thunderous blasts reverberating in the air.
Just then the plane veered west toward Avenue Haig, and Long-Long’s mother pulled him from the roof. “Hurry. It’s not safe up here,” she said, dragging the boy inside as he wriggled for a better view.
Back downstairs, Benny ran from window to window to see if any soldiers were coming down the streets. With his mother and amah busy gathering up his sisters and brother, he slipped out the door. Beyond the quiet lanes of Dasheng lilong, fire trucks and police cars sped by, sirens wailing. People buzzed about, seeking news and sharing rumors. Some said that thousands of people had been killed near the British racecourse, in the heart of the International Settlement.
Suddenly a hand clamped on to his arm. Benny jumped. It was his amah. “Young Master, you must come home now. Your mother is talking on the telephone with your father. He will be very angry if a bomb kills you!”Amah had been with the family for so long that she had been his mother’s amah too. On another day, Benny might have dared her to catch him, but he sensed that this was not the time. Back inside their home, he could hear his mother talking on the phone in his father’s study.
“What? In the International Settlement on Tibet Road? Thousands of people killed near the Great World?” She paused, then asked, “How is Grandfather?”
Benny straightened as his mother spoke of his beloved grandfather, whose large mansion was on Tibet Road, not far from the Great World Entertainment Center. His grandfather sometimes took him there to wander through its funhouse mirrors, roller-skating rink, and multiple stories of curiosities and attractions. His mother disapproved, wary of the drunken sailors, beckoning women, and other unsavory characters who lingered there.
Product details
- Publisher : Ballantine Books (February 18, 2020)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 544 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0345522338
- ISBN-13 : 978-0345522337
- Item Weight : 14.4 ounces
- Dimensions : 5.19 x 1.16 x 8 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #78,289 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #61 in Asian & Asian American Biographies
- #81 in Chinese History (Books)
- #2,547 in Memoirs (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
Helen Zia's latest book, Last Boat out of Shanghai: The Epic Story of the Chinese who Fled Mao's Revolution, launches in January 2019 and traces the lives of emigrants and refugees from another cataclysmic time in history that has parallels to the difficulties facing migrants today. She is also the author of Asian American Dreams: The Emergence of an American People, a finalist for the prestigious Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize and coauthor, with Wen Ho Lee, of My Country Versus Me, about the Los Alamos scientist who was falsely accused of being a spy for China in the “worst case since the Rosenbergs.” She was Executive Editor of Ms. Magazine and a founding board co-chair of the Women's Media Center. Her ground-breaking articles, essays and reviews have appeared in many publications, books and anthologies, receiving numerous awards.
The daughter of immigrants from China, Helen has been outspoken on issues ranging from human rights and peace to women's rights and countering hate violence and homophobia. She is featured in the Academy Award nominated documentary, Who Killed Vincent Chin? and was profiled in Bill Moyers' PBS series, Becoming American: The Chinese Experience. In 2008 Helen was a Torchbearer in San Francisco for the Beijing Olympics amid great controversy; in 2010, she was a witness in the federal marriage equality case decided by the US Supreme Court.
Helen received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the Law School of the City University of New York for bringing important matters of law and civil rights into public view. She is a Fulbright Scholar and a graduate of Princeton University’s first coeducational class. She attended medical school but quit after completing two years, then went to work as a construction laborer, an autoworker, and a community organizer, after which she discovered her life’s work as a writer.
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Customers find the book engaging and educational. They appreciate the well-written, personal history content that teaches history in a humanized way. The stories are meaningful and complex, told through the lives of four individuals. Readers praise the writing quality as entertaining and detailed. The book shows how people can survive and thrive, even during the very worst of times. The characters are described as real and believable.
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Customers find the book engaging and well-written. They describe it as a thrilling read with a tight plot. Readers appreciate the extensive research and beautiful storytelling.
"...capture, much more eloquently than my Amazon review, why it’s such a great read...." Read more
"...is, a book more about history than personal story, but still an interesting book...." Read more
"This work of non-fiction reads like a novel. It is well written, exciting, educational, historic, and well worth reading...." Read more
"...The novelistic approach is not only a great read, it is a great ride through a unique time in the history of the Middle Kingdom and Shanghai in..." Read more
Customers find the book's history content engaging. They appreciate the personal approach to history, with compelling real-life stories. The book provides a great insight into life in China and the tribulations of war. It is well-crafted and well-researched, providing an excellent account of events from 1937 to 1957.
"...Perry summed it up the best by describing The Last Boat as: “Impeccably researched and beautifully crafted ... Zia offers a warmly human perspective..." Read more
"...lots of questions arise, but this is what it is, a book more about history than personal story, but still an interesting book...." Read more
"...It helps the reader understand the breath and depth of refugee issues and the importance of every individual story...." Read more
"...knowledge of China you will be transported to a time and a place that you cannot imagine...." Read more
Customers enjoy the meaningful and entertaining story. They find the intricate stories of four individuals and families complex and beautifully told. The book is described as a great ride through a unique time in Middle Eastern history, with poignant and compassionate storytelling.
"...The most poignant and compelling story of the book is that of Bing – the author’s own mother, who sailed on the last ship to leave Shanghai in 1949,..." Read more
"This is a deeply meaningful story of German refugees in Shanghai during World War Two...." Read more
"This work of non-fiction reads like a novel. It is well written, exciting, educational, historic, and well worth reading...." Read more
"...The novelistic approach is not only a great read, it is a great ride through a unique time in the history of the Middle Kingdom and Shanghai in..." Read more
Customers enjoy the engaging writing style and personal touch of the book. They find the stories gripping and highly informative, with a detailed understanding of the perspective of the Mao revolution. The book makes history more relatable and approachable for readers.
"This work of non-fiction reads like a novel. It is well written, exciting, educational, historic, and well worth reading...." Read more
"...that this is the prodigious result of a decades' work by an extraordinary writer. This is reality on novelistic form...." Read more
"It reads like a novel: so well written and the "plot" is tight because it really happened; also because the author did a stunning job of choosing..." Read more
"...I am so excited about this book. Incredible writing. Outstanding book" Read more
Customers find the book inspiring. They say it shows how people can survive and thrive even during the worst times. The author tells an epic story of perseverance and courage despite obstacles. They describe the book as heartfelt, moving, and deeply detailed. The stories powerfully demonstrate the fragility of all that is familiar. Readers find the lessons to be learned while thoroughly entertained and consider it a great learning experience.
"...Love, drama, and hopefulness. I highly recommend!" Read more
"...It is well written, exciting, educational, historic, and well worth reading...." Read more
"...They all persevere through extreme hardships and really help me realize how lucky I am to be born in the United States." Read more
"Exceptional lessons to be learned while being thoroughly entertained with these four personal histories...." Read more
Customers find the characters believable and well-written. They appreciate the author's choice of realistic individuals and their determination and grit. The focus on just five individuals whose entries recur as they age is appreciated. Overall, customers find the book portrays humanity well.
"...The author went deeper and broader in her choice of characters and the diligence paid off...." Read more
"...read, both in its revealing information and its portrayal of the humanity of it all...." Read more
"...-told, its stories inspire awe at the determination and grit of the four protagonists, proving again that immigrants have enriched our nation and..." Read more
"...The stories enclosed are very well written the characters very real and believable...." Read more
Customers enjoy the book's pacing. They find it engaging, with an in-depth look at the personal experiences of immigrants. The author does a stunning job of selecting personal details and crafting the book beautifully. Readers appreciate the clear depiction of children as individuals.
"...best by describing The Last Boat as: “Impeccably researched and beautifully crafted ... Zia offers a warmly human perspective on one of the most..." Read more
"...was written by the daughter of Chinese immigrants and she did an excellent job. in addition to her personal experiences, her research is flawless...." Read more
"...is tight because it really happened; also because the author did a stunning job of choosing the personal experiences that are woven together to tell..." Read more
"...Real in-depth look - and feel." Read more
Customers find the book's premise engaging. They say it's based on true events and real people, with evidence for every aspect of the story. The story is believable and authentic, well-told.
"...This is not fiction. A real story about real people and the horror they lived through. We are so lucky to live in a democracy...." Read more
"A very moving tale, told as a novel, but based on fact, with evidence given for every aspect of the story...." Read more
"...stories enclosed are very well written the characters very real and believable...." Read more
"What an amazing story, all true and so well written. If you feel sorry for yourself, read this book, and you'll think twice...." Read more
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A marvelous American experience story
Top reviews from the United States
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- Reviewed in the United States on February 2, 2019This book is a masterpiece of historical literature that will bring tears to your eyes with stories that you probably had no idea existed. Why had they not been told? Perhaps for many reasons, but one common thread is that it seems these remarkable emigrants who fled Shanghai 70 years needed a voice, and they could not have found a better writer to tell it than Helen Zia. As one of the four main characters of the book, Annuo Liu, exclaimed to Helen: “I’ve been waiting for someone to tell our story.”
The most poignant and compelling story of the book is that of Bing – the author’s own mother, who sailed on the last ship to leave Shanghai in 1949, the General Gordon. Helen’s recount of Bing’s life, from misery and poverty in war-torn China, to her narrow escape from Shanghai and her turbulent start in America, is a heart-wrenching but majestically loving tribute to her mother. Sadly, we learn from the acknowledgements – at the end of the book – that Bing suddenly died before Helen’s book was completed. Fortunately for Helen, her family and the rest of us, Bing’s story had already been recorded for posterity. We also recently learned from an op-ed in the New York Times that it was only through Helen’s dogged persistence that Bing’s story even emerged. Helen reveals that Bing kept it a secret because she “thought she was protecting her children by not telling us her harrowing tale of fleeing China.”
Helen’s book is such a warm and historically accurate page-turner that reading it brings to mind that old Walter Cronkite TV series called “You Are There.” Helen’s book was years in the making, involving painstaking research, travel and countless interviews that are explained in her acknowledgements and end notes. Officially launched a mere 10 days ago, Helen Zia’s book has received many rave reviews from other writers and sinophiles that incisively capture, much more eloquently than my Amazon review, why it’s such a great read. I think Harvard Professor Elizabeth J. Perry summed it up the best by describing The Last Boat as: “Impeccably researched and beautifully crafted ... Zia offers a warmly human perspective on one of the most wrenching political transitions of the twentieth century.”
Bing found her voice in Helen. It’s so sad that she did not live to see her story told in The Last Boat.
- Reviewed in the United States on November 1, 2024This is a deeply meaningful story of German refugees in Shanghai during World War Two. A story of love weaves its way through the war with cultural clashes between the love story of a Chinese woman and German Jewish man who becomes stateless. Love, drama, and hopefulness. I highly recommend!
- Reviewed in the United States on April 29, 2019This book is more about the sweep of history with a particular focus on Shanghai in the 30s to the 50s. Rather than backdrop, the story of the rise of Chinese Communism in a weak China often takes front and center. The threads of four people’s lives from childhood to adulthood are woven, sometimes a bit too lightly, into the historical brocade: two males and two females, and ultimately a sister of one of the males, is added to the mix, resulting in five separate stories.
The title of the book is a metaphor - only one of the five actually gets on that “last boat out of Shanghai” to San Francisco. One comes to the US two years before the Communist take-over; one escapes to Taiwan; one makes it to Hong Kong; one is stuck in China and suffers the consequences. In the very end, they all make it to America and that’s how the author gets wind of their stories.
I wonder if I had read each person’s story separately if I would’ve gotten more out of it. For a 430-page book, each person’s story averages less than a hundred pages, not a lot for each person who’s survived to an old age. As such, lots of questions arise, but this is what it is, a book more about history than personal story, but still an interesting book. And you do see pragmatism arise out of circumstance, and the effects of decision and indecision.
The ending in a sense reminds me of a Broadway musical I had seen years ago in the 70s, Pacific Overtures. (I’m dating myself and I know the play’s more about Japan, China’s mortal enemy at the time.) The endings of both make a giant leap from a pivotal historical period to the present with a fast enumeration of current-day accomplishments; in the book, Ms. Zia offers us a list of present-day luminaries, all of whom have Shanghainese blood. The book then concludes with a few afterthought lines comparing the plight of the five Shanghainese to those of current refugees worldwide. A convenient ending.
- Reviewed in the United States on July 21, 2021This work of non-fiction reads like a novel. It is well written, exciting, educational, historic, and well worth reading. The chaotic time between the Japanese take over in the 1930's and the rise of the Communists is viewed through the lives of 4 different fascinating people who managed, eventually, to have their stories told and to reclaim their lives through endurance, education, and grit. It helps the reader understand the breath and depth of refugee issues and the importance of every individual story. I can't stop thinking about these families and what they suffered and endured in order to survive and eventually thrive. Wonderful read. Don't miss it.
- Reviewed in the United States on April 13, 2019I had to keep reminding myself that this is the prodigious result of a decades' work by an extraordinary writer. This is reality on novelistic form. The author went deeper and broader in her choice of characters and the diligence paid off. Even if you have knowledge of China you will be transported to a time and a place that you cannot imagine. The experience of WW II, the pre and post war periods is rapidly receding as those who lived the experience die out. Helen Zia brings the time and people to life through more than diligent research. Her parents lived the transition, and their experience is in the author's DNA. The novelistic approach is not only a great read, it is a great ride through a unique time in the history of the Middle Kingdom and Shanghai in particular.
Top reviews from other countries
- BrianReviewed in Canada on August 21, 2024
5.0 out of 5 stars Incredible Story
The author makes you feel like you intimately know the real life characters in this story. It's also a great learning tool for those who don't know about the Japanese occupation of China and in particular, Shanghai. Riveting story.
- DrogoReviewed in the United Kingdom on August 18, 2024
5.0 out of 5 stars worth reading
makes shanghai a place to visit
- DanieleReviewed in Italy on April 23, 2023
3.0 out of 5 stars A captivating look into the lives of 4 individuals during a pivotal moment in Chinese history
Helen Zia's "The Last Boat Out of Shanghai" takes us on a gripping journey through a turbulent period in Chinese history, focusing on the lives of four individuals caught in the chaos of the Chinese Civil War and the rise of the Communist Party. While the novel presents a fascinating exploration of the human cost of political upheaval, I felt that it falters in its execution which is why I feel it deserves 3/5 stars.
The novel revolves around four central characters: Bing, Annuo, Benny, and Ho, each hailing from different social backgrounds and experiencing the events unfolding in Shanghai in their own unique ways. Bing, an unwanted girl adopted by her third family, faces the Japanese invasion of Shanghai in 1937 at the age of nine, eventually escaping to the United States. Annuo, the daughter of a high-ranking Nationalist government official, is forced to leave the city multiple times due to her father's prominence, experiencing a range of restrictions and obstacles as she pursues her education.
Benny, a privileged teenager living in the French Concession, grapples with his father's questionable actions during the war, eventually fleeing Shanghai to escape his family's past. Ho, a bright and talented young man from a wealthy landowning family, relentlessly pursues his studies and dreams of launching an automobile manufacturing company, eventually emigrating to the United States.
As the conflict between the Nationalists and Communists intensifies, these four characters are forced to make life-altering decisions, leading them to confront the realities of leaving their homes and seeking refuge elsewhere.
The most poignant and compelling story is that of Bing – the author’s own mother, who sailed on the last ship to leave Shanghai in 1949, the General Gordon. Helen’s recount of Bing’s life, from misery and poverty in war-torn China, to her narrow escape from Shanghai and her turbulent start in America, is a heart-wrenching but majestically loving tribute to her mother.
A key aspect of the novel is its exploration of xenophobia and prejudice. The Chinese harbor animosity toward the Japanese, the Nationalists clash with the Communists, Chinese immigrants in the U.S. face discrimination and label Americans as "white devils," and the Shanghainese in Hong Kong have to conceal their backgrounds due to Cantonese hostility. These issues add depth to the narrative, shedding light on the complexities of human relationships during times of crisis.
While "The Last Boat Out of Shanghai" presents a compelling narrative, I felt that the pacing was uneven and the story sometimes jumped between the perspectives of the four protagonists too rapidly, leaving me disoriented.
However, the novel's strength lies in its exploration of the emotional and psychological toll of political upheaval on its characters. The protagonists are relatable and well-developed, allowing the reader to connect with them and empathize with their struggles. Zia skillfully weaves the historical context of the Chinese Civil War into the narrative, providing a rich backdrop for the characters' journeys.
The novel also delves into themes of family, loyalty, and the human capacity for resilience in the face of adversity. These themes are explored through the characters' relationships with one another, as well as their individual struggles to reconcile their pasts with the uncertain future that lies ahead.
Helen Zia's "The Last Boat Out of Shanghai" offers a captivating look into the lives of four individuals caught in the turmoil of a pivotal moment in Chinese history. While the novel occasionally suffers from uneven pacing and disjointed storytelling, it ultimately provides a thought-provoking exploration of the human cost of political upheaval. It is a worthwhile read, deserving of a 3 out of 5 stars rating, for those interested in understanding the personal stories behind these historical events.
- MarkReviewed in Australia on September 20, 2020
5.0 out of 5 stars Enjoy the book
Good
- Cheryne H.Reviewed in Canada on February 14, 2021
4.0 out of 5 stars Struggles to Victory
A real eye opener to the war time struggles of the Chinese families who wanted a life of freedom and peace and the hardships they went through to achieve it. Shame on all the countries that rejected and persecuted them.