Our five most read Asian book stories of 2019, about activist Joshua Wong’s philosophy, love and loss in China, and more
- Hong Kong activist’s manifesto for global democracy, love in 20th century China and in Thailand – the books that most interested you tackled big issues
- The item that most interested readers was an extract of a history of the Nepalese Gurkhas in the British Army covering the 1960s riots in Hong Kong
Articles about sex and love, the Hong Kong riots in the 1960s and Hong Kong’s democracy movement were among the South China Morning Post’s most popular books stories in 2019.
Here are the top five.
5. Mixed-race love in Thailand
Patcharin Lapanun’s Love, Money and Obligation: Transnational Marriage in a Northeastern Thai Village is a powerful reminder of how interconnected the world has become – and how love can develop between people from completely different backgrounds.
This preview of Unfree Speech: The Threat to Global Democracy and Why We Must Act Now, said the title, by Hong Kong democracy activist Joshua Wong, would be “a powerful and urgent manifesto for global democracy”, according to its publisher.
British writer Rajeev Balasubramanyam, in an interview to promote his new book Professor Chandra Follows his Bliss, said Hong Kong was “effectively a creative desert … It’s not a place that values intellectuals or artists particularly. What it gives you is money. And intellectuals and artists need money”.
Author and journalist Xinran Xue has written a number of non-fiction books about women in contemporary China.
In The Promise: Love and Loss in Modern China she goes back in time to examine the changes in love and marriage since the Republican era.
In Gurkha Odyssey, Peter Duffell, former commander of the British forces in Hong Kong, tells the story of 200 years of service by the Nepalese Gurkhas.
In an edited excerpt, Duffell describes a city rocked by riots during the 1960s – events that resonate today as the city again struggles with unrest.
