LoveReading Says
Fluidly inter-weaving many lives and two timelines, this remarkable debut begins in Malaysia in 1942. When Japanese troops move in, seventeen-year-old Wang Di is sent to a military brothel to be a “comfort woman”. The experiences of these women are unflinchingly portrayed as Wang Di breaks a sixty-year silence. Then there’s twelve-year-old Kevin, a bullied, visually-impaired boy who hears his dying grandmother make a confession in 2000, a revelation that drives him to discover the truth about his family.
Haunting, harrowing, sweeping and compelling, this is a courageous story of survival, memory, and how we deal with trauma.
Reviewed by Joanne OwenJoanne Owen’s lifelong love of reading and writing began when she was growing up in Pembrokeshire, and very much wished that witches (and Mrs Pepperpot) were real.
More reviews by Joanne Owen About How We Disappeared
A beautiful, stunningly ambitious novel set in Singapore about a woman who survived the Japanese occupation and a man who thought he had lost everything. For fans of Min Jin Lee's Pachinko and Georgia Hunter's We Were the Lucky Ones. Singapore, 1942.
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Jing-Jing Lee Press Reviews
`A heartbreaking but hopeful story about memory, trauma and ultimately love.' - New York Times
`A powerful tale of wartime Singapore and the shame of silence...haunting... Read it and weep, read it and marvel, but above all, read it.' - South China Morning Post
`A beautifully written, suspenseful story of redemption and healing.' - Booklist (Starred Review)
`An elegiac and at times extremely harrowing novel... How We Disappeared bears unflinching testimony to war crimes that are still on the brink of living memory.' - The Straits Times, Singapore
`A beautifully controlled novel that tells an utterly compelling and important story. Jing-Jing Lee's prose is crystal clear, the narrative scope is sweeping and devastating, and the story is as deeply felt and well observed as it is captivating.' - Caoilinn Hughes, author of Orchid & the Wasp
'Jing-Jing Lee writes like a poet... This was a hard story to tell, to hear and to read, but it is also an important story which demands to exist and Jing-Jing Lee has brought it to life... Congratulations. Every single hour I spent reading this was an hour which could not have been better spent.' - Catherine Chanter, author of The Well
`Heartbreaking and meticulously researched, this novel is a meditation on the legacy of violence.' - Book Riot
`A heartbreaking story told with such humanity and grace. The details of How We Disappeared are so vivid they return to me in dreams.' - Marti Leimbach, bestselling author of Dying Young and Daniel Isn't Talking
'A shattering, tender and absorbing novel... Meticulously researched, exquisitely written, with characters that will live and breathe in your heart long after you finish the last page... I'm reeling from its power-what an absolute triumph.' - Fiona Mitchell, author of The Maid's Room
'How We Disappeared is a masterpiece of storytelling. Evocative and heart rending, it tells of one woman's survival in occupied Singapore, and the quest of a child to solve a family mystery. It is beautifully written, exquisitely crafted, and utterly compelling.' - Mary Chamberlain, author of The Dressmaker of Dachau and The Hidden
`This is a brilliant, heartbreaking story with an unforgettable image of how women were silenced and disappeared by both war and culture.' - Xinran, author of The Good Women of China
'How We Disappeared is a remarkable, original novel that uncovers the long-silenced atrocities that the `comfort women' in Singapore suffered at the hands of the Japanese during WWII. Through gorgeous prose, tremendous pathos, and even humor, Jing-Jing Lee portrays the intersection of past and present and the courage to bear witness. How We Disappeared is an important, spell-binding debut. - Spencer Wise, author of The Emperor of Shoes
'An exquisite mystery, an enthralling novel. Equally touching and intriguing, How We Disappeared is a soaring debut of surviving the unsurvivable [and] a searing and shocking reminder of a history many would like to forget, and of the endurance of the human spirit.' - Eoin Dempsey, author of White Rose, Black Forest
`Jing-Jing Lee's novel is a testament to...strength in the face of profound cruelty.' - OUTinPerth
`Memory and forgetting are at the heart of How We Disappeared... Lee's novel shines a light into the darkest chapter of Singapore's history.' - SA Weekend
`A powerful and confronting story... How We Disappeared puts a blowtorch to our emotions.' - Qantas magazine, Travel Insider
