The Saffords are a typically odd lot, the parents struggling with their place in the world and the children embodying many dislikeable traits. These are familiar characters in English novels and Berry writes them with confidence.

Issues of place and people and identity are never far from the surface. The Safford family is clearly out of place in Hong Kong, despite their wealth and power, but nor are they really at home in England. On another level, this is a novel about spirituality with sanitised western religion juxtaposed against eastern beliefs. There are, indeed, ghosts throughout this novel, one even taking its turn as narrator.

There is much to like in this novel. The domestic dramas are engaging and the spiritual dimension lifts the prose from the prosaic. Berry shows the clash of culture between the British rulers and the Hong Kongers with clarity, a portrait it has to be said that’s not very flattering to the Brits. And she uses Chinese spirituality with respect, weaving in spirits of monkeys, bears, and even headless budgies.

These elements are really engaging. That said, I found some aspects grating. It takes more than half the book (and at almost 400 pages in total, that’s a long time) before we understand the relationship between Alice Safford and the spirit of Lin Shui, a young girl who was raped and murdered during the World War II.

The usually warm narrative is also shattered every so often with brutal accounts that seem jarring and out of place. Some readers might enjoy this realism but I prefer a more subtle hand; after all, what is hinted at can be more sinister than what is revealed. In all, these are small criticisms of a very original and quite grand novel. – Harper Collins, $32.99