The Hong Kong Letters | Gwulo: Old Hong Kong

The Hong Kong Letters

Book type: 
Dates of events covered by this document: 
Sun, 1968-09-01 to Thu, 1970-12-31

The Hong Kong Letters by Gill Shaddick is published by Australian Scholarly Press under their Arcadia imprint. (ISBN 978-1-925801-63-7) and is available through booksellers or at online book stores. Gill lived in Hong Kong for two years in the late sixties.
www.gillshaddick.com

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In 1969, at the height of China’s Cultural Revolution, a yacht sails out of Hong Kong and disappears. The world’s press takes up the story of the crew who are presumed lost at sea. But Gill and her friends are very much alive, held captive in a Chinese fishing village by Communist militia. As she faces questioning by the People’s Liberation Army, there’s a lot that Gill would rather not tell - that her crew-mates are British soldiers, her flatmates are Japanese, old adversaries of the Chinese, or that her boss, the doyen of advertising in Hong Kong, is well known for ‘firing Reds’.

In this spirited memoir, where 'Mad Men' meets Han Suyin’s 'A Many Splendoured Thing', Gill recreates a Hong Kong of the imagination. Twenty-one, attractive and naïve, wined and dined by Hong Kong’s elite, Gill learns to stand her ground at her job in an advertising agency under the directive of the narcissistic Mrs Church. Her luck changes when Paddy O’Neil-Dunne joins the firm - he is just as eccentric but much more fun. After several visits to a casino in the nearby Portuguese enclave of Macau, O’Neil-Dunne embarks on the longest roulette game ever played and he insists Gill join in. But Gill finds the sparkling waters of Hong Kong’s seascape more seductive than the world of business and money, takes up sailing and falls in love.

The backdrop is a gift. The Colony is an anachronism, a last vestige of British colonialism. Yet as Communist ideology gathers pace in neighbouring China, Hong Kong seizes every new opportunity and so does the author. A tale of unexpected twists and a host of funny, bizarre and whimsical events are captured in her lyrical memoir.

Comments

Gill Shaddick is the author of The Hong Kong Letters, her memoir of an eventful two years working at an ad agency in Hong Kong in the late 1960s. Among other things, her yacht was seized by Chinese militia, and she was held incommunicado, after she unwittingly strayed into PRC waters at the height of China’s Cultural Revolution.

Drop by and chat to Gill, and publisher Pete Spurrier, from 12:00 noon to 2:00pm at Bookazine in Prince’s Building. Gill will be signing books and talking about her story.

When: Saturday October 19th

Where: Bookazine, Shop 326-328, 3/F, Landmark Prince’s Building, Central, Hong Kong. Tel: 2522 1785.

We hope to see you there!