When Sleeping Women Wake

An epic and emotional story of three spirited women - a mother, her daughter, their maid - during the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong

1941. The wealthy Tang family has settled in Hong Kong after fleeing Shanghai. As the First Wife of the family, Mingzhu leads a glamorous but lonely existence - mothering the son of her husband's concubine, overseeing her daughter Qiang's education, and directing their household of servants, including her long-time confidante, Biyu.

When the Japanese invade the island, the three women's paths wildly diverge. Mingzhu's affinity for languages spares her physical labour but she's coerced into serving an enemy captain. Qiang and Biyu suffer brutal factory work and food rations until an encounter with the East River Column Resistance fighters separates them. As war rages around them, each woman holds onto the hope that the others are alive. Can they fight for their freedom and still find their way back to each other?

Fans of Lisa See, Kristin Hannah and Anthony Doerr, storytellers who blend historical accuracy with personal narrative, will love this book. Through years of impeccable research, Australian-Chinese novelist Emma Pei Yin breathes new life into real events. At once monumental and intimate, heartbreaking and hopeful, When Sleeping Women Wake is an exquisitely written novel about the unbreakable bonds that unite women.

'A breathtaking, important story of family, love and endurance told with unflinching clarity and beauty, this is historical fiction at its finest. I urge you to read this book.' WIZ WHARTON, author of Ghost Girl, Banana

'I devoured Emma Pei Yin's heart-rending, transportive, and action-packed When Sleeping Women Wake in a single day' ASHTON LATTIMORE, author of All We Were Promised

'With vivid historicity and deeply relatable characters, When Sleeping Women Wake is a lushly romantic and impassioned story of women's agency and resilience' JUHEA KIM, internationally bestselling author of Beasts of a Little Land

'A spellbinding tale of transformation, resilience, and the quiet power of awakening . . . When Sleeping Women Wake lingers in the mind long after the final page' AYESHA INOON, award-winning author of Untethered

'All the things I love in a book: strong women, untold history and a rollicking story.' VICTORIA PURMAN, author of The Women's Pages

'A skilfully written epic that sheds light on a little-known corner of history . . . Emma Pei Yin breathes exquisite life into this tale of romance, resistance and self-discovery' LAUREN CHATER, author of The Lace Weaver

'Compelling, be