Awards

• Long-listed for HWA Debut Crown Award 2019
• Long-listed for Women's Prize for Fiction 2020
• Short-listed for Singapore Literature Prize 2020

Overview

  A beautiful tale of endurance, identity, and memory in WWII Singapore, for fans of Min Jin Lee's Pachinko and Nguyen Phan Que Mai's The Mountains Sing Singapore, 1942. As Japanese troops sweep down Malaysia and into Singapore, a village is ransacked. Only three survivors remain, one of them a tiny child. In a neighbouring village, seventeen-year-old Wang Di is bundled into the back of a troop carrier and shipped off to a Japanese military rape camp. In the year 2000, her mind is still haunted by her experiences there, but she has long been silent about her memories of that time. It takes twelve-year-old Kevin, and the mumbled confession he overhears from his ailing grandmother, to set in motion a journey into the unknown to discover the truth. Weaving together two timelines and two life-changing secrets, How We Disappeared is an evocative, profoundly moving and utterly dazzling novel heralding the arrival of a new literary star. Shortlisted for the 2020 Singapore Literature Prize * Longlisted for the HWA Debut Crown 'A heartbreaking but hopeful story about memory, trauma and ultimately love.' New York Times  

Full Product Details

9781786074126

Table of Contents

Reviews

`This is a brilliant, heart-breaking story with an unforgettable image of how women were silenced and disappeared by both war and culture.' * Xinran, author of <i>The Good Women of China</i> * `A heartbreaking story told with such humanity and grace. The details of How We Disappeared are so vivid they return to me in dreams.' * Marti Leimbach, author of <i>Dying Young</i> and <i>Daniel Isn't Talking</i> *

`This is a brilliant, heart-breaking story with an unforgettable image of how women were silenced and disappeared by both war and culture.' * Xinran, author of <i>The Good Women of China</i> * `A heartbreaking story told with such humanity and grace. The details of How We Disappeared are so vivid they return to me in dreams.' * Marti Leimbach, author of <i>Dying Young</i> and <i>Daniel Isn't Talking</i> * 'A shattering, tender and absorbing novel that centres around the unfathomable cruelty that women in Singapore endured...Meticulously researched, exquisitely written.. I'm reeling from its power-what an absolute triumph.' * Fiona Mitchell, author of <i>The Maid's Room</i> * 'How We Disappeared is an exquisite mystery, an enthralling novel. Equally touching and intriguing, How We Disappeared is a soaring debut of surviving the unsurvivable in a time when human life was worth less than the bullets and bombs used to end it. A searing and shocking reminder of a history many would like to forget, and of the endurance of the human spirit.' * Eoin Dempsey, author of <i>White Rose, Black Forest</i> *

`A beautifully controlled novel that tells an utterly compelling and important story. Jing-Jing Lee's prose is crystal clear, the narrative scope is sweeping and devastating, and the story is as deeply felt and well observed as it is captivating.' * Caoilinn Hughes, author of <i>Orchid & the Wasp</i> * 'Jing-Jing Lee writes like a poet... This was a hard story to tell, to hear and to read, but it is also an important story which demands to exist and Jing-Jing Lee has brought it to life... Congratulations. Every single hour I spent reading this was an hour which could not have been better spent.' * Catherine Chanter, author of <i>The Well</i> * `A heartbreaking story told with such humanity and grace. The details of How We Disappeared are so vivid they return to me in dreams.' * Marti Leimbach, bestselling author of <i>Dying Young</i> and <i>Daniel Isn't Talking</i> * 'A shattering, tender and absorbing novel... Meticulously researched, exquisitely written, with characters that will live and breathe in your heart long after you finish the last page... I'm reeling from its power-what an absolute triumph.' * Fiona Mitchell, author of <i>The Maid's Room</i> * 'How We Disappeared is a masterpiece of storytelling. Evocative and heart rending, it tells of one woman's survival in occupied Singapore, and the quest of a child to solve a family mystery. It is beautifully written, exquisitely crafted, and utterly compelling.' -- Mary Chamberlain, author of <i>The Dressmaker of Dachau<i> and </i>The Hidden</i> `This is a brilliant, heart-breaking story with an unforgettable image of how women were silenced and disappeared by both war and culture.' * Xinran, author of <i>The Good Women of China</i> * 'How We Disappeared is a remarkable, original novel that uncovers the long-silenced atrocities that the `comfort women' in Singapore suffered at the hands of the Japanese during WWII. Through gorgeous prose, tremendous pathos, and even humor, Jing-Jing Lee portrays the intersection of past and present and the courage to bear witness. How We Disappeared is an important, spell-binding debut. * Spencer Wise, author of <i>The Emperor of Shoes</i> * 'An exquisite mystery, an enthralling novel. Equally touching and intriguing, How We Disappeared is a soaring debut of surviving the unsurvivable [and] a searing and shocking reminder of a history many would like to forget, and of the endurance of the human spirit.' * Eoin Dempsey, author of <i>White Rose, Black Forest</i> *

`A heartbreaking story told with such humanity and grace. The details of How We Disappeared are so vivid they return to me in dreams.' * Marti Leimbach, bestselling author of <i>Dying Young</i> and <i>Daniel Isn't Talking</i> *

`A heartbreaking but hopeful story about memory, trauma and ultimately love.' * <i>New York Times</i> * `A powerful tale of wartime Singapore and the shame of silence...haunting... Read it and weep, read it and marvel, but above all, read it.' * <i>South China Morning Post</i> * `Culturally authentic...the writing has grace.' * <i>Sunday Times</i> * `The brilliance of the writing makes it harder to bear. It's powerful and profound.' * <i>Irish Independent</i> * `A beautifully written, suspenseful story of redemption and healing.' * <i>Booklist</i> (Starred Review) * `An elegiac and at times extremely harrowing novel... How We Disappeared bears unflinching testimony to war crimes that are still on the brink of living memory.' * <i>The Straits Times,</i> Singapore * `A beautifully controlled novel that tells an utterly compelling and important story. Jing-Jing Lee's prose is crystal clear, the narrative scope is sweeping and devastating, and the story is as deeply felt and well observed as it is captivating.' * Caoilinn Hughes, author of <i>Orchid & the Wasp</i> * `Raises poignant questions regarding multi-generational trauma, accelerated modernization, and changing identity... Lee vibrantly describes life in pre-occupation Singapore, managing to cinch both the particularity and the universality of oppression.' * <i>Singapore Unbound</i> * 'Jing-Jing Lee writes like a poet... This was a hard story to tell, to hear and to read, but it is also an important story which demands to exist and Jing-Jing Lee has brought it to life... Congratulations. Every single hour I spent reading this was an hour which could not have been better spent.' * Catherine Chanter, author of <i>The Well</i> * `Heartbreaking and meticulously researched, this novel is a meditation on the legacy of violence.' * <i>Book Riot</i> * `A heartbreaking story told with such humanity and grace. The details of How We Disappeared are so vivid they return to me in dreams.' * Marti Leimbach, bestselling author of <i>Dying Young</i> and <i>Daniel Isn't Talking</i> * 'A shattering, tender and absorbing novel... Meticulously researched, exquisitely written, with characters that will live and breathe in your heart long after you finish the last page... I'm reeling from its power-what an absolute triumph.' * Fiona Mitchell, author of <i>The Maid's Room</i> * `The dazzling storytelling illuminates the brutalities of life in Japanese-occupied Singapore... Haunting, harrowing, sweeping and compelling, this is a courageous story of survival, memory, and how we deal with trauma.' * <i>LoveReading</i> * 'How We Disappeared is a masterpiece of storytelling. Evocative and heart rending, it tells of one woman's survival in occupied Singapore, and the quest of a child to solve a family mystery. It is beautifully written, exquisitely crafted, and utterly compelling.' * Mary Chamberlain, author of <i>The Dressmaker of Dachau<i> and </i>The Hidden</i> * `This is a brilliant, heartbreaking story with an unforgettable image of how women were silenced and disappeared by both war and culture.' * Xinran, author of <i>The Good Women of China</i> * 'How We Disappeared is a remarkable, original novel that uncovers the long-silenced atrocities that the `comfort women' in Singapore suffered at the hands of the Japanese during WWII. Through gorgeous prose, tremendous pathos, and even humor, Jing-Jing Lee portrays the intersection of past and present and the courage to bear witness. How We Disappeared is an important, spell-binding debut. * Spencer Wise, author of <i>The Emperor of Shoes</i> * 'An exquisite mystery, an enthralling novel. Equally touching and intriguing, How We Disappeared is a soaring debut of surviving the unsurvivable [and] a searing and shocking reminder of a history many would like to forget, and of the endurance of the human spirit.' * Eoin Dempsey, author of <i>White Rose, Black Forest</i> * `Jing-Jing Lee's novel is a testament to...strength in the face of profound cruelty.' * <i>OUTinPerth</i> * `Memory and forgetting are at the heart of How We Disappeared... Lee's novel shines a light into the darkest chapter of Singapore's history.' * <i>SA Weekend</i> * `A powerful and confronting story... How We Disappeared puts a blowtorch to our emotions.' * <i>Qantas</i> magazine, Travel Insider * `A story of survival and endurance in Japanese-occupied Singapore.' * <i>Deccan Herald</i> *

Author Information

Jing-Jing Lee was born and raised in Singapore. She obtained a master's degree in Creative Writing from Oxford in 2011, and has since seen her poetry and short stories published in various journals and anthologies. Jing-Jing’s novella, If I Could Tell You, was published by Marshall Cavendish in 2013 and her debut poetry collection, And Other Rivers, was published by Math Paper Press in 2015. How We Disappeared is her first novel. She currently lives in Amsterdam.

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