Amid hordes of protesters at the G20 summit in London, one stood out above the rest: With Bare Hands author Alain Robert climbed the Lloyds Building to draw attention to climate change. The fearless wall crawler is also the subject of an in-depth feature story in the New Yorker this month, as well as stories in The Independent and The [...]
It’s interesting how a new book can single-handedly open up a new section of the market. We always publish in the Asian niche, but the publication of Wing Chun Warrior has suddenly brought interest from a host of Chinese-language bookshops that we’ve not previously sold through. The key to this was an appearance by author Ken Ing on RTHK Radio [...]
On Saturday I attended a very enjoyable event at the Hong Kong International Literary Festival: a panel of three authors, Rana Dasgupta, Xujun Eberlein and Nam Le discussing the art of the short story. Moderator was Chris Wood of the Asia Literary Review. Thankfully not all the panellists agreed with one another, so there was an element of back-and-forth which [...]
To Singapore, where Southeast Asia's largest bookshop -- Kinokuniya on Orchard Road -- has agreed to host a book signing event with Alain Robert. The French wall-climber, author of With Bare Hands, is in town for a few days and we've taken the chance to line up some interviews with Singaporean newspapers and Mediacorp radio. Despite having lived in the [...]
Chinese fung shui tells us there is a dragon inhabiting every green valley, protective of the mountains and its route to the sea. Hiking into the hills of Hong Kong for a weekend picnic, Siu Ming and his parents suddenly find their path blocked by a forest fire. Can the mountain dragon help? Or is the mythical creature equally at [...]
Just months after he was expelled from China for climbing Shanghai's tallest building without permission, a daring French climber is preparing to scale another Chinese peak — but this time at the invitation of the government. Alain Robert, dubbed the French Spiderman for his ascents up some of the world's tallest buildings without climbing gear, will scale one of China's [...]
From Clearwater Bay to Tai Long Wan, the Sai Kung Peninsula is Hong Kong’s back garden – a place where people go to swim, hike, eat seafood alfresco, and otherwise escape the city. But besides the popular beaches and waterfront restaurants, there is an abundance of hidden attractions, and artist Lorette Roberts has discovered them for this book. Such is [...]
Author Muhammad Cohen appeared on television twice during September to talk about his new novel, Hong Kong On Air. Click on the links to watch the clips from TDM Macau with Herbert Ramos and Bloomberg with Bernard Lo.
Excited spectators gathered with their camera phones today to watch daredevil Alain Robert scale the 88-storey Jin Mao Tower in Shanghai. The 420-metre ascent ended in arrest for the fearless Frenchman, but he took it in his stride: having climbed the world's three tallest buildings barehanded, he wasn't about to let the fourth-tallest pass him by. Reuters has the story: [...]
Asian publishing pundit Nury Vittachi says of our spy thriller: IN TERMS OF geopolitical value for money, Paul Ulrich’s new book Saudi Match Point has it all: Al-Qaeda, the Chinese government, oil wars, a high level US conspiracy, a hostage crisis and the battle between radical Islam and modern mores. Paul's based in Hong Kong. The plot: The US government [...]
Yeeshan Yang’s book of investigative journalism Whispers and Moans has been brought to the big screen by Hong Kong filmmaker Herman Yau. Starring Athena Chu, Candice Yu and Monie Tung, the movie (Chinese title: 性工作者十日談) had its premiere at the Hong Kong International Film Festival on 28th March. The prolific Herman Yau is this year’s Director in Focus. There’s an [...]