Successful psychologist Wu Lan begins reading old journals to find the reasons behind her father's suicide, and discovers the story of young Lee Ah Choi, sold into prostitution, and her affair with runaway Chow Chat Mui, while her mother Mahmee comes to terms with the death of her husband and the loss of her daughter to a different culture, in a novel that interconnects the past and present lives of four extraordinary women. 25,000 first printing.

This Place Called Absence

Kwa, Lydia

Literature & Fiction

Kensington Pub. Corp

Shares the stories of four Chinese women from disparate backgrounds, including psychologist Wu Lan, who finds herself unable to shake the remnants of her traditional Singapore upbringing and who is tormented by her father's apparent suicide. A first novel. Original. 10,000 first printing.

Lydia Kwa's voice is drenched in memory. Speaking at several junctures, both Singapore-born and Vancouver-habituated, her poetry carries the pain and historic wealth of her passage. It murmurs stories, laconic, profound, stories that tell whole shapes of lives in a few lines. Family anecdotes, fragments of intimacy, life stories of friends - these poems open windows onto the compulsions that form inner landscapes. Equally at hom ein a finely cadenced erotic lyric or candid and multi-layered prose, her writing resonates well beyond the edge of the page.""- Daphne Marlatt

Colours of Heroines, The

Poetry

Women's Press (UK)

Life in seventh-century China teems with magic, fox spirits, and demons; there is a fervent belief that the extraordinary resides within the lives of both commoners and royalty. During the years when the empress Wu Zhao is gaining ascendancy in the Tang court, her evil-minded lover Xie becomes obsessed with finding and possessing the oracle bone, a magical object that will bestow immortal powers on him. Standing in his way is Qilan, an eccentric Daoist nun who rescues an orphaned girl named Ling from being sold into slavery; Qilan takes her under her wing, promising to train her so she may avenge her parents’ murders. In another part of the city, a young monk named Harelip questions his faith and his attraction to other men as he helps the elder monk Xuanzang to complete his translation of the Heart Sutra, the sacred Buddhist scripture. Meanwhile, as the mysteries and powers of the missing oracle bone are revealed, it remains to be seen whether Qilan will be able to stop Xie from gaining possession of the magical bone, and at what cost.This extraordinary magic-realist novel by Singapore-born author Lydia Kwa employs and subverts traditional tropes of Chinese mythology to tell a tale of greed, faith, and female empowerment with a wickedly modern sensibility.Lydia Kwa is a novelist, poet, visual artist, and a psychologist in private practice. Her novel This Place Called Absence was shortlisted for the Books in Canada First Novel Award.

Oracle Bone

United States

Arsenal Pulp Press

The Walking Boy is a quest novel set in early eighth-century Tang Dynasty China, in the final days of the rule of the first Female Emperor Wu Zhao. The ailing hermit monk Harelip sends his disciple Baoshi on a pilgrimage from Mount Hua to Chang’an, the Western capital; Baoshi is the “walking boy” charged with locating Harelip’s missing former lover Ardhanari. Baoshi lives with a secret only his Master knows, and he is filled with fears of being discovered. On his journey, Baoshi crosses paths with both commoners and imperial officials, as well as others who take delight in their queer identities; in doing so, he is released powerfully from his past shame.  Lydia Kwa's novel is a book of quiet subversion, upending classical Chinese tropes with contemporary ideas around gender and feminism. Filled with psychological complexities, magic and poetic allusions to classical Chinese literature, The Walking Boy explores the intrigue of inner alchemy while exorcising the ghosts of history.

The Walking Boy (Qhuanqi Trilogy, 2)

Set in 8th century China during the Tang Dynasty, The Walking Boy is a vivid and compelling novel inspired by true historical events during the final years of the reign of the country's only female emperor. Abandoned as a young child to the care of an aging hermit monk, Baoshi lives a simple and pious life in an isolated mountain shack. Although called a boy, Baoshi carries with him a secret only his master knows:he was born both male and female. When he is just 16, the young disciple is sent on a quest to find his master's former lover. So begins the walking boy's journey to Chang'an, the ancient Western Capital and the epicentre of the Tang Dynasty, ruled by the bitter and aging Female Emperor. Baoshi soon finds himself embroiled in a ghost story set amongst the sumptuous and elaborate rituals of the palace, a decadent world of corruption and intrigue, passion and desire. The Walking Boy is a contemporary re-visioning of 8th century China that employs the narrative conventions of the classical Chinese novel through the prism of a hauntingly modern story of love and longing, power and greed, and the individual's search for meaning.

The Walking Boy: A Novel

Contemporary

Key Porter Books

Set in contemporary Toronto and Singapore, Pulse is the story of Natalie, a native Singaporean transplanted to Toronto’s Chinatown. When she hears the devastating news that Selim, the son of her old best friend (and former lover), has died in mysterious circumstances, she decides to return to Singapore to uncover the truth. Bound up in Selim’s story is the relationship between Natalie and her father, a domineering man whose treatment of his daughter may be the key to understanding Selim’s death.

Pulse

Literary

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Kwa, Lydia. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Kwa, Lydia

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Kwa, Lydia. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

This Place Called Absence

This Place Called Absence

Colours of Heroines, The

Oracle Bone

The Walking Boy (Qhuanqi Trilogy, 2)

The Walking Boy: A Novel

Pulse