Contemporary short fiction from Afghanistan, all written before the Taliban retook power in August 2021. An extraordinary collection brought into being through the efforts of UNTOLD's Write ... read more
Xi Jinping is head of the CCP, head of state and commander-in-chief of the military, with an indefinite period in office; he's centralised power, increased state control of the economy and i... read more
From the home of the indigenous Formosans to a European trading post, from a Japanese colony to the last bastion of the Republic of China. Essential reading for anyone who wants to understan... read more
A strange and magical memoir of growing up in prosaic England with Anglo-Burmese parentage. Teak trees interweave oaks; myth and imagery chase each other through the author's odyssey through... read more
The 60 years following the Portuguese arrival in the Moluccas in 1511 saw an epic global struggle for the sources and distribution of this new geyser of wealth. Told with verve and authority... read more
The grandmother in question was Vietnamese, and exiled in the Vietnam war. A good-looking book on this healthy and nourishing cuisine. Has Ducasse's imprimatur so should be excellent.
This is the first publication of Hugh Trevor-Roper's private journal of his visit to the People's Republic of China in 1965, shortly before the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution. It also d... read more
The author has been travelling in China for 30 years. This is her first book, and it is a compelling portrait of the country's culture and its recent mutations.
The tricky business of merging the inner world with the outer - a balancing act that the generous Iyer has been practising for decades now, in Tibet, Japan, Korea, Iran and elsewhere.
A fine illustrated survey from the prehistoric to the present that looks at the interplay between different parts of Asia and also with the rest of the world.
Somerset Maugham appears as one of two narrators in this atmospheric novel of love, truth, secrecy and betrayal in 1920s' colonial Penang. Eng's airy storytelling is a rare gift: he gives hi... read more
Vintage Japanese crime fiction, by a master of the genre, first published in 1950: the head of a clan leaves a very peculiar will, and its reading is followed by a series of unusual murders.
Eight decades of Japanese architecture and design, approached chronologically. More illustrations than there are pages; the author has spent four of these decades based in Japan.
Takes the reader from the earliest written accounts to the present in vivid portraits. The empress Masako is there, and presumably princess Murasaki Shikibu, whose diary is not only fascina... read more
Culinary archaeology following the trails of ancient maritime trade through Indonesia, Malaysia, China, Vietnam, Thailand, Sri Lanka, India, Iran and the Emirates. Transporting stuff.