Falling Leaves by Adeline Yen Mah

Introduction

Adeline Yen Mah's childhood in China during the civil war was a time of fear, humiliation and isolation. The cause of this was not the political upheaval but systematic emotional and physical abuse by her step-mother and siblings and rejection by her father. Thought to bring bad luck because her mother died giving birth to her, Adeline Yen Mah was discriminated against by her family all her life. Falling Leaves is both the moving saga of how she survived that rejection and an enthralling saga of a Chinese family, from the time of the foreign concessions to the rise of Communist China and the commercial boom of Hong Kong.

Reviews

'Charged with emotion…a vivid portrait of the human capacity for meanness, malice - and love'
Jung Chang

'Falling Leaves is a terrible and riveting family history…It is also a story about endurance and the cost it can exact…gripping'
Caroline Moorhead, The Daily Telegraph

'The pain of so much emotional abuse leaps from every page … the most amazing aspect of this story is that Adeline managed to survive…and emerge triumphant…compelling'
Val Hennessy, The Daily Mail

Extract

Extract

From Chapter 3

Ru Ying Sui Xing: ' Inseparable as each other's shadows'

Shanghai in the late 1920's was an exhilarating city for a young girl such as Aunt Baba. While the rest of China still travelled by pushcarts, sedan chairs and horse-drawn carriages, in Shanghai shining imported motor cars were speeding down well-paved roads alongside trams and buses. Giant, colourful billboards advertising British cigarettes, Hollywood movies and French cosmetics gazed down at crowded pavements teeming with young men in suits and ties and girls clacking around in high heeled shoes and stylish quipaos. The Bund, close to the Women's Bank on Nanking Road, had been transformed into a panorama of majestic buildings sweeping along the Huangpu River. Gun boats, steamers, sampans, and tug-boats festooned the muddy waters. Multi-storied department stores, such as Sincere, Wing-On, Dai-Sun and Sun-Sun were crammed full of furs, jewellery, toys, household goods and the latest Parisian fashions. Large enough to rival Selfridges or Macy's, these emporiums promoted seasonal sales and even held concerts and theatrical performances………

Aunt Baba often took the train from Shanghai to Tianjin, a two day journey in those days, and stayed for long visits. Father and Mother would meet her at the station in the Buick and the three would spend hours catching up on Shanghai gossip. According to Aunt Baba it was an idyllic time for them all.

Mother's obstetrician, Dr Ting, was almost a member of the family by the time my three brothers were born. When my mother became pregnant with me, the political situation in China had deteriorated drastically. Japanese soldiers were everywhere, wearing surgical masks and carrying bayonets, demanding bows and obeisances, taking bribes and threatening violence. The foreign concessions remained neutral, small havens of uneasy independence amidst a vast sea of Japanese terror. The rest of Tianjin was now occupied territory under Japanese rule. In the evenings now there were blackouts and curfews. Special permits were needed to cross key points at night, especially those conduit streets and bridges leading from the concessions into Japanese patrolled areas.

My mother's labour pains started at four in the morning on 30 November 1937. Father did not possess the papers required to drive her past Japanese sentries on the way to the Women's Hospital. However, Dr Ting had been issued with a pass to allow her to travel freely at night. She arrived an hour later and my birth was uneventful. … The headaches and fever started three days after I was born. Mother's temperature soared to 103 degrees and stayed there. Her lips were cracked and blistered. Her mind became cloudy and she was incoherent. Dr Ting diagnosed puerperal fever. In those days before penicillin this was virtually a death sentence. .. Her condition worsened. Doctor after doctor but to no avail. A dark cloud hung over the entire family.

Towards the end there was a short period of lucidity. With father weeping at her side, she spoke to her parents-in-law and saw her children one by one calling out each name with yearning. When Aunt Baba came in to say goodbye, Mother was weak but clear headed. She smiled at my aunt and asked for a hot dog. Then she added sadly, 'I've run out of time. After I'm gone please look after our little friend here who will never know her mother.'

My mother died two weeks after my birth, with five doctors at her bedside. She was only thirty years old and I have no idea what she looked like. I have never seen a photograph.

Readers Comments

I had this book recommended by a friend and once I'd started it I found it almost impossible to put down. Adeline's problems through her life made mine seem insignificant. I laughed and cried (and on the train that was hard to explain) and I was disappointed when I'd finished. The way it was so evocative that I felt I knew the streets she talked of. I would highly recommend this book to anyone, and have done!

Ann Cozens, London