Review | Rich poor gap in Hong Kong the theme of new short stories collection
- ‘I don’t know anywhere else in the world you can fly so high, so fast, and come down so hard,’ says a character in the aptly named anthology Highs and Lows
- Its 21 stories are full of humour, cynicism, and love for the city
Hong Kong Highs and Lows, various authors, edited by Chris Maden, with Lilla Csorgo and Dominic Sargent, pub. Hong Kong Writers Circle
4/5 stars
There may be no better title than Highs and Lows for a book about Hong Kong, a city of Peak mansions and tiny cage homes, jet-setting billionaires and homeless vagrants.
The 21 short stories in this anthology published by the Hong Kong Writers Circle explore the gap between the very rich and the very poor. The overriding theme – or perhaps the lesson to be learned – is how easy it is to fall from one to the other. Bad luck, poor choices, crime, violence and suicide can happen to anyone, even the affluent. And if you fall from grace in Hong Kong, there is no safety net to catch you.
The theme of hubris is as old as the ancient Greeks, who warned of Icarus falling from the heavens after flying too close to the sun. Replace Icarus with our modern-day gods – the tycoons, the bankers, the gold-diggers with glamorous Instagram accounts – and you have the characters of Hong Kong Highs and Lows.
