I could drown in Chang's prose. I get lost in it. It is evocative of an era. Her scenes are lush, her dialogue and plot are fraught and taut, without crossing that line into ick.

She never over explains things, if anything, she under-explains them.

Such is the case of Lust, Caution.

I had to read the end three times before I fully understood what happened. For the first half of this novella, we see a young woman waiting for her old lover (both married.) She is nervous and tense, and the reader easily falls into the trap of believing her emotions are due to fear of being discovered.

And of course, they are. But not by her lover's wife. But rather, in this Japanese-occupied Shanghai because she is a Nationalist spy, the femme fatale, her lover a target that she is setting up.

And that's when the story turns. But all 57 pages hold tension, like a single plucked violin string.

Amazing.

Also, usually Wade-Giles transliterations bug me, so I loved the translator's note that she went with Wade-Giles over pinyin in order to keep the mood of the piece. I think it was a choice that really worked, and I'm happy that it was a conscious decision and that she included that information.

see my complete review, and more, at www.tushuguan.blogspot.com ( )