by Mingmei Yip
As all these questions were swimming through my mind, I spotted the newspaper being read by the man in the next deck chair. When I read the headline, my heart beat like the surging waves.
Massacre at Luxury Villa, Gangsters Dead
As soon as the man had finished reading, I gathered up my best smile and politely asked if I could borrow his paper.
The article read:
Last night there was a shoot-out between rival gangs at a luxury villa rumoured to belong to Master Lung, head of the Flying Dragons. Ten bodies were found. It is likely that some others were wounded but got away. Several of the dead were suspected members of Big Brother Wang’s Red Demons gang.
There is no news of Master Lung. He has disappeared, and so has his chief bodyguard, Gao. His right-hand man Zhu was found dead several miles away from the villa.
Lung Jinying, the master’s son, was also injured but will be released from hospital soon. Our reporter asked him about the shooting and whether he suspected that a traitor had tipped off the shooters, but he said he knew nothing about it.
Police Chief Li promised a full and complete investigation into this atrocity. However, with other suspected gang shootings in Shanghai, the perpetrators have never been arrested.
Last night, the police searched for Camilla, known as the Heavenly Songbird, to inquire about her patron’s whereabouts. But she also was nowhere to be found. Police Chief Li is investigating the possibility that she had something to do with this gangster war and expects that she will be found soon.
To my great relief, the buildings of Shanghai were now dots in the distance as the ship rose and fell on the swells of the open sea. If the police had guessed that I was on this ship, they would have come after it by now. Anyway, we would soon be in international waters. By the time they figured it out, if they ever did, I would be in the British Crown Colony of Hong Kong.
I continued to flip the pages until my eyes landed on Rainbow Chang’s column:
The Disappeared Shadow
Since the disastrous Great Escape show, we haven’t heard from the magician Shadow. Rumours fly. Some say she took her own life out of humiliation; others say that she went back to where she came from, which is who knows where. Anyway, we miss her and hope one day she’ll reappear as dramatically as she disappeared.
As for Camilla, we haven’t heard from her, either. Maybe she’s also hiding out somewhere to restore her energy. But we think she may never show up in Shanghai again. Some doctors say that during her contortion show, when she couldn’t disentangle her body, she might have suffered from too little oxygen, her brain is a little fogged. Maybe that’s why she was willing to be Shadow’s assistant at the Great Escape show and let her rival be the star.
Will our beloved, legendary Heavenly Song bird ever fly back to her nest in Shanghai and massage our eardrums again?
I definitely hope so. For we all want to know the secrets behind that mysterious face.
More to follow …
Rainbow Chang
So I was leaving with another sly dig from Rainbow, this time that my brain was damaged. But what did it matter? In a few days I would be in Hong Kong, no longer the Heavenly Songbird but also no longer Lung’s mistress or Big Brother Wang’s spy. And Rainbow could write whatever she wanted about me; I would never even read it.
Maybe someday I would travel to the Gold Mountain – America. Wherever I ended up, I would place an altar for my parents and make offerings to them to appease their souls. But I would not make offerings to my baby boy, Jinjin. Because he had come to me so often in my dreams, I hoped that he was alive somewhere. After all, Madame Lewinsky would not show me his little body, so I wondered if she was hiding him somewhere to raise as her own. I wanted to think so, because then he was being cared for, even though, like me, he would never know his own mother.
As I looked out over the sea stretching endlessly away from me, I felt a tremendous sadness. Yes, I’d soon have many things in life – except the man I loved and who loved me even more. But at least I had been loved, and by two men, not just one.
I also found myself wondering about my two skeleton sisters, Shadow and Rainbow. Would we cross paths again someday? If so, would we be friends or enemies or both?
But for me there would be no going back. Even if Lung was dead, whoever succeeded him as boss would need to regain face for the gang by finding the woman who had taken their treasure. And even if little Jinjin were living there, would I be able to recognise him?
But we do not decide these things; heaven does, never telling us her plans in advance.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to thank my husband, Geoffrey Redmond, who, like a magician, turns every experience into a pleasure. Without Geoffrey’s encouragement, I never would have enjoyed the colourful, creative life of a writer, a profession I have aspired to since I was seven.
Besides being a caring, compassionate and extremely knowledgeable endocrinologist, Geoffrey is also an excellent writer who has penned six books, the most recent being a medical text for laypeople, It’s Your Hormones, and one on Asian religion and philosophy, Science and Asian Spiritual Tradition.
Before and since I became a published author, I benefited by attending numerous writers’ conferences. I would like to especially thank Lewis Frumkes for the annual conference at Hunter College, where I shared experiences with enthusiastic readers and writers. Through RT Book Review and RWA I meet wonderful writers, readers and dedicated staff who are always helpful and make me feel at home.
I would also like to thank: my agent Susan Crawford, at Crawford Literary Agency. Professor Jiayan Mi, who invited me to the College of New Jersey for a lecture on my novel Song of the Silk Road, and Ellen Scordato and her husband, Mark Rifkin, who have greatly aided my writing career.
Special thanks to some of the writers who have helped me along my writer’s journey: Kitty Griffin, Kate Douglas, Mary Jo Putney, Shobhan Bantwal, Marilyn Brant, Lisa Dale.
And, of course, thanks to those at Kensington Books who gave me tremendous help: my wonderful editor, Audrey LaFehr, and her associate, Martin Biro, publicists Karen Auerbach and Vida Engstrand, and Kristine Mills-Noble, who designed beautiful covers for all my books.
I would also like to thank my friends Teryle Ciacica, who always warms my heart with her cheerful voice and smile, and Eugenia Oi Yan Yau and her husband, Jose Santos, who are always ready to lend a helping hand.
A READING GROUP GUIDE
MEMOIRS OF A COURTESAN
Mingmei Yip
ABOUT THIS GUIDE
The questions and discussion topics that follow are intended to enhance your group’s reading of this book.
Discussion Questions
How does Camilla’s training to have no emotion affect her life as a singer and as a spy?
What strategies does Camilla employ to survive, despite being a pawn in the struggle between the two most powerful gangster heads in Shanghai?
The biggest change in Camilla’s life is from an emotionless woman to someone who can finally love. Which of her experiences result in this change and how?
What is the relationship between Camilla and Madame Lewinsky? What happens when Camilla goes into labour and turns to Lewinsky for help? What happens to Camilla’s baby and why? How does this experience affect Camilla?
Why does Master Lung proclaim Camilla his lucky star? What do you think about being a lucky star in someone else’s life?
What kind of person is Master Lung’s son, Jinying? How has being the son of a gangster affected his character?
The feud between Camilla and the magician, Shadow, is both physical and mental. Why are they enemies, and who do you think emerges as the winner?
What is the role of the gossip columnist Rainbow Chang in Shanghai’s gangster world, and what does she want from Camilla?
Why does Camilla attempt suicide, and how does this change her?
Camilla cares for both Gao and Jinying. How would you characterise her feelings
for each of them?
What meaning does the scene from the opera Peony Pavilion have for Camilla?
What do you think about the ancient Chinese strategies in the Art of War and the Thirty-Six Stratagems, and how do they apply in real life?
What is the outcome of Camilla’s plan to kill Master Lung?
About the Author
Mingmei Yip was born in China, received her PhD from the University of Paris, Sorbonne, and held faculty appointments at the Chinese University and Baptist University in Hong Kong. She has published five books in Chinese, and has written for major Hong Kong newspapers. She has appeared on over forty TV and radio shows in Hong Kong, Taiwan, China and the USA. She immigrated to the United States in 1992 and now resides in Manhattan.
Visit her website at www.mingmeiyip.com, on Twitter @Mingmeiyip and on Facebook/MingmeiYipAuthor.
ALSO BY MINGMEI YIP
Song of the Silk Road
Petals from the Sky
Peach Blossom Pavilion
About the Publisher
Australia
HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty. Ltd.
Level 13, 201 Elizabeth Street
Sydney, NSW 2000, Australia
http://www.harpercollins.com.au
Canada
HarperCollins Canada
2 Bloor Street East – 20th Floor
Toronto, ON, M4W, 1A8, Canada
http://www.harpercollins.ca
New Zealand
HarperCollins Publishers (New Zealand) Limited
P.O. Box 1
Auckland, New Zealand
http://www.harpercollins.co.nz
United Kingdom
HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
77-85 Fulham Palace Road
London, W6 8JB, UK
http://www.harpercollins.co.uk
United States
HarperCollins Publishers Inc.
195 Broadway
New York, NY 10007
http://www.harpercollins.com
