Shanghai Baby is a semi-autobiographical novel written by Chinese author Wei Hui.
The novel's narrator and main character, supposedly a semi-fictionalised version of the author, is a 25 year old Shanghainese woman named Nikki, or Coco to her friends, a waitress in a Shanghai cafe. Coco is trying to write a first novel after previous success publishing a collection of sexually frank short stories. At the cafe, Coco meets a young man, Tian Tian, fo...
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Shanghai Baby is a semi-autobiographical novel written by Chinese author Wei Hui.
The novel's narrator and main character, supposedly a semi-fictionalised version of the author, is a 25 year old Shanghainese woman named Nikki, or Coco to her friends, a waitress in a Shanghai cafe. Coco is trying to write a first novel after previous success publishing a collection of sexually frank short stories. At the cafe, Coco meets a young man, Tian Tian, for whom she feels extreme tenderness and love. However, Tian Tian – an artist – is reclusive, impotent and an increasing user of drugs. Despite parental objections, Coco moves in with him, leaves her job and throws herself into writing.
Shortly afterwards Coco meets Mark, a married German expatriate businessman living in Shanghai. The two are uncontrollably attracted and begin a highly charged, physical affair. Torn between her two lovers, and tormented by her deceit, her unfinished novel and the conflicting feelings involved in love, lust and...
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