Dear all,
Here’s something for your reading lists as the new term starts:
Written by academic and novelist Jo McMillan, The Happiness Factory would be a refreshing addition to reading lists for courses such as Chinese women, family, gender and sexuality. And it would be of interest to scholars in any area of Chinese Studies who might want an example of how academic concerns can be explored in new, creative ways.
Mo Moore, estranged daughter of a sex-aid entrepreneur, regards her father as good as dead. And then he really does die and leaves her all his wealth. Stuck in a job in elderly care, newly single, and with nothing and no-one to keep her in England, Mo does what she’s always done when things get tough: she runs. It could have been anywhere, but a classified ad catches Mo’s eye, and it takes her to China. She lands in Pingdi, a remote mountain village that for centuries supplied dildos to the Imperial bedchamber, and whose revived sex-aid factory is in a financial fix. Soon Mo finds herself on the wrong side of the authorities and needing all the help she can get: China is a land of pointing fingers and blind eyes, of closed doors and open secrets, of rules and recklessness – a place, she discovers, where it’s not easy to be female.
The Happiness Factory is published by Bluemoose Books.
Posted by: Jo McMillan <jo@jomcmillan.com>