|
|
As the author of two Hong Kong-centered novels, I am guilty of the former sin. In The Hong Kong Foreign Correspondents Club, narrator Alice Giles goes so far as to suggest that the history of the colony might well be written from the day she arrived from the U.S. on the Pan Am Clipper. That was supposed to be arch, but it's a fact that the Hong Kong novel, despite inevitable descriptions of sharp-elbowed crowds and aromatic streets, is fundamentally Eurocentric. Historically, there's some justification: Britain created the place, and foreign devils ran the trading houses, the police, the spy service and other haunts where protagonists and antagonists tend to clash. The local literary scene is undeveloped, and foreign publishers tend to like a little West-meets-East. The literary result, however, is a Hong Kong always described as transitory, though the essence of the city is a population of 6 million Chinese who came and stayed, and a fictional world that would seem doomed if foreigners were sent packing July 1. Intrigue and suspense would come to a halt. Love affairs would nevermore occur with Butterflys but no Pinkertons. Bargirls would go broke--this may be true--and even music would vanish, for the background score of every Hong Kong novel is provided by the indispensable Filipino band. On the pulp side, the handover to China presents a major challenge, since the premise of most page-turners is something going horribly wrong during the lead-up. Author William H. Lovejoy manages a finesse in his China Dome, a story of terrorism at a gigantic new airport. The book begins in August 1997--and for reasons unexplained, the Chinese have yet to take control, although they're going to any minute.
|
            
|
