Joseph Kanon

In 1938, as Nazi persecution intensifies across Europe, Shanghai becomes an unlikely refuge for Jewish refugees fleeing Germany. But escaping persecution does not mean escaping danger. Daniel Lohr, a German Jew who has survived the Gestapo, arrives in Shanghai hoping to begin again. Penniless and stateless, he turns to his uncle Nathan, a mysterious businessman who runs a glamorous nightclub and maintains dangerous connections with the city’s criminal underworld. Meanwhile, Daniel cannot forget Leah, a woman he met during the voyage to China, whose fate becomes entangled with his own. As political tensions rise and Japanese occupation looms, Daniel is drawn into a world of gang warfare, corruption, espionage, and shifting loyalties. In a city where survival depends on knowing whom to trust, every alliance carries a price—and the past is never entirely left behind. Atmospheric and suspenseful, Shanghai brings to life a city caught between cultures and conflicts, where desperate refugees, gangsters, and political operatives struggle to survive. Joseph Kanon explores the moral compromises people make in extraordinary circumstances, asking how much of oneself can be sacrificed in the pursuit of safety.