From the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Book Eaters comes a dark fantasy set in a historical Hong Kong that combines ancient myths and local legends into a haunting story of ghosts, grief, and women who will not forgive. When Mercy Chan washed up on the shores of Hong Kong with no family, no money, and no memories, she was thrust into the horrors of World War II. She survived by hiding in Kowloon Walled City, an infamous, ghost-infested slum full of lost and traumatised civilians. Since the end of the war, she has rebuilt her life and found work with the local triad as a ghost-talker, dealing with the angry and bitter spirits who haunt this place. These days, the alleyways of Kowloon feel like home. But the past she can’t remember won’t let her go. An unusually powerful ghost has infested Kowloon’s waterways, drowning innocents and threatening the district. Unnervingly, it claims to know Mercy—and her forgotten childhood. As Mercy is drawn into a deadly cat-and-mouse game with this malignant spirit, she begins to realize that the monster she fights within these walls may well be one of her own making. Thirty-three years before, mere days ahead of the Japanese invasion, Sung Siu Yin and her mother flee Hong Kong, intending to hide out on her mother's ancestral island home. It’s beautiful, tranquil, and remote… but also inhabited by ghosts ever since the entire village drowned in a storm many years ago. Still, it’s better than living under occupation. But as the war drags on and isolation sets in, Siu Yin is increasingly drawn into the island's grim past—a past that may still have a hold on the present. There is a darkness lurking beneath that idyllic ocean, and it has been waiting many years for someone to return.
I will never get tired of that “cover to be revealed” graphic, it’s unreasonably exciting and mysterious.
UK reviewers, if you’d love an arc, please reach out! Priority for physical and audio will be given to folks who have accessibility needs for certain formats ❤️
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