The Last Rose of Shanghai by Weina Dai Randel

Is it better to grow up poor and then become rich or grow up rich and become poor?  In The Last Rose of Shanghai by Weina Dai Randel, it is better to be poor and then become rich.  If you are born poor you’ll know how to survive, whereas if you’re born rich and then become poor you won’t know how to feed yourself.  The Last Rose is about the Japanese occupation of Shanghai in WWII.  The story starts with an American filmmaker in a hotel in Shanghai in 1980 Shanghai, China meeting the millionaire businesswoman Aiyi Shao.  Aiyi then tells the filmmaker the story of Shanghai housing many Jewish refugees who fled from German-occupied Europe during WWII.  Before the occupation, Aiyi is a wealthy heiress running a jazz club.  Then she meets Ernest Reismann who is one of the penniless Jewish refugees.  He’s a piano player and connects with Aiyi through music.  Aiyi makes multiple complex decisions that have consequences for a lot of different people.  She has wealth, loses it all, and then gains it again.  She’s quite the character!  The ending had a twist which was good closure.  There’s nothing rosy about the story, but the writing is incredible.  There were so many characters I didn’t like and I felt like I was in the story which says a lot about the storytelling.  I already requested her earlier book, The Empress of Bright Moon.  I can’t wait to enjoy more of the colorful, emotional writing.