The year is 1883. China is dithering on the verge of bankruptcy. In the countryside antagonism against foreigners and missionaries is growing and the warlords are at large. Li Ling, a young peasant girl in China, flees to Malaya to escape being made a concubine to a warlord only to find herself tricked into becoming a second wife to a rich man with sadistic tendencies. Her life becomes intertwined with that of her rescuer, Shao Peng, the daughter of a rich and powerful Chinese family that had established themselves in Malaya. Read about their lives in a Malaya that is rapidly transforming under British rule. A Flash of Water follows New Beginnings and together with Sweet Offerings and Bitter-Sweet Harvest forms a quadrilogy, which traces the lives of one family against the turbulent political, economic and social changes in China and Malaya.

Set in a Malaysia emerging from the outbreak of racial conflict in 1969, Bitter-Sweet Harvest tells of the difficulties and tensions involved in a marriage between a Malay Muslim and a Chinese Christian. Atmospheric, dramatic, action-packed and intriguing, it is peppered with local flavour evoking the heat, colours and sounds of Southeast Asia. Prepare to be taken on a spell-binding journey through contrasting cultures: from the learned spires of Oxford in England to the east coast of Peninsula Malaysia; from vibrant Singapore to Catholic Rome and developing Indonesia.

A tale of two women, their loves, lies and resilience during the Emergency in Malaya. When young and naive Ruth set out to look for her husband Mark in Malaya in 1950, little did she expect to find herself in a country split by war and ideology and a rival for her husband's love that is as lovely and exotic as May. A story of human resilience, lies, treachery and love set during the Emergency in Malaya.' "The backdrop is Malaya in its twilight years as a British possession, and Malaysia at its dawning, with the cruel Emergency period between as centre ground. As ever, the author tells it how it was, with complete objectivity and fairness where concerns the evanescent expatriate Brits, the aristo Malays and the thrusting Chinese. A tangled web of love stories it may be, yet there is suspense on every page. But whatever else is suspended, it is never our belief in the characters or the action." —Bill Jackson, Editor, The Corporal and the Celestial. "Although Chinese May and...