In advance of Graham Earnshaw’s talk at the Beijing Bookworm on Saturday, here’s a chapter from his brand new book, The Great Walk of China. After crossing flat country for most of the distance from Shanghai, Graham finds himself in the Dabie Mountains of rural Anhui Province. Chapter 2: Drinking Games The day’s walk was over and I returned to [...]
In related developments, Hong Kong residents are taking to the hills in record numbers -- at least, if sales of this guidebook are anything to go by. Other Asian cities don't have such spectacular mountains and beaches so close at hand, so we're lucky to have such a wonderful natural resource. Check out some of the photos in this book [...]
With students at Chinese colleges accused this month of conducting cyber attacks on US businesses in and outside China, plus the alleged Mossad involvement in the assassination of a Hamas leader in Dubai, I’m reminded of Paul Ulrich’s spy thriller Saudi Match Point, in which Chinese and American spies compete to seize control of the Saudi oilfields. An excerpt below. [...]
The Beijing Bookworm -- the city's best known bookshop -- holds its Literary Festival again from the 5th-19th of March 2010, and two Blacksmith authors are among the 70 writers taking part. First, on Saturday 6th March, Graham Earnshaw will be talking about how many pairs of shoes he has worn out during his epic westward trek across the People's [...]
How long would it take to walk from Shanghai to the edges of Tibet? Long-time China resident Graham Earnshaw is in the process of finding out. His westward trek is described in his new book, The Great Walk of China, out at the end of this month. Through his conversations with the people he meets along the way, Earnshaw paints a [...]
High ridges, sparkling waterfalls, lush feng shui woods and ancient fishing communities nestled in rocky harbours. Your mind refreshed, your limbs exercised, and your senses intoxicated, you wonder at the fact that only a few miles separate all this from one of the world’s most crowded cities. The Serious Hiker's Guide to Hong Kong -- the bestselling guidebook to the [...]
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What to believe? The story of Google’s threatened exit from China has occupied a lot of column inches over the past fortnight. On one hand, its stand has been lauded as principled by many people. On the other, it may just be a well timed PR stunt for the company; its reputation has been receiving a hammering lately from authors, [...]
Can common ground be found on the divisive issue of Tibet? First, it’s necessary to find out what the people involved think, and why. Chinese-speaking journalist Annelie Rozeboom worked as a foreign correspondent in China for ten years. During that time she was able to interview numerous Tibetan people inside and outside Tibet, as well as Chinese and Western observers [...]
Singapore's beautiful Raffles Hotel hosted the launch of Lorette Roberts' latest book: Sketches of Singapore. (Thanks to the hotel for the complimentary Singapore Slings!) Razor TV filmed a three-part interview with Lorette, which includes lots of illustrations from the book. Watch below or directly at the Razor TV site. The book has been reviewed by Time Out Singapore and Expat [...]
Feng Chi-shun's Kowloon memoir Diamond Hill has been in the shops for a few weeks and has gained good reviews in the South China Morning Post, Time Out Hong Kong, Cairns Media Magazine and now The Correspondent, whose reviewer writes "The book finishes only to leave the reader wanting more -- it's a good read." Click on the following link [...]
I'm delighted to say that our titles will be available through bookshops in the United States and Canada as of June 2010. Our books will be handled on the other side of the Pacific by National Book Network. First up for the American market is With Bare Hands, since daredevil author Alain Robert has made a point of [...]
You may enjoy a few helpings of siu mai, char siu bau and har gau at your local dim sum restaurant. But did you know some places have up to 60 dim sum dishes on the menu? If you don't read or speak Chinese, you're sometimes stuck with ordering from the tourist menu, and this is far more [...]
If you were unable to attend the FCC launch of Mike Rowse's tell-all book No Minister, have no fear -- the former civil servant will be signing copies at two Hong Kong bookstores in early December. Mike will first be at Dymocks in Prince's Building, Central, at 1:00 pm on Thursday 3rd; and he follows this up with an appearance [...]
Veteran Hong Kong and China journalist Graham Earnshaw -- who is currently engaged on a series of walks from Shanghai to Tibet, picking up each time from the place he left off -- was interviewed this week for Shanghai Urbanatomy's Why I Write column. His latest book, The Great Walk of China, will appear in early 2010. Graham will also [...]
If you're in Central on Monday lunchtime, you could spend half an hour queueing up with the office drones for a bowl of instant noodles. Alternatively you could drop into Bookazine on the third floor of Prince's Building, where prize-winning Irish author Colm Tóibín will be signing books including his latest novel Brooklyn. Tóibín has been short-listed for the Man Booker [...]
Three copies of Bernd Hagemann's Sleeping Chinese are on their way to readers who can stay awake long enough to answer this question: There are sixty minutes in an hour. But how many winks are there in a nap? Answers to pete at blacksmithbooks dot com, Asian postal addresses only. (Does not include the Land of Nod).
Judge for yourself via my six-feet-of-seaview-cam. Beautiful, yes. Good for our health, probably not.