A ravishing historical novel of one of China's most controversial historical figures: its first and only female emperor, Empress Wu, who emerged in the Tang Dynasty and ushered in a golden age.
 In seventh–century China, during the great Tang dynasty, a young girl from the humble Wu clan entered the imperial gynaecium, which housed ten thousand concubines. Inside the Forbidden City, she witnessed seductions, plots, murders, and brazen acts of treason. Propelled by a shrewd intelligence, an extraordinary persistence, and a friendship with the imperial heir, she rose through the ranks to become the first Empress of China. On the one hand, she was a political mastermind who quelled insurrections, eased famine, and opened wide the routes of international trade. On the other, she was a passionate patron of the arts who brought Chinese civilization to unsurpassed heights of knowledge, beauty, and sophistication. 
 And yet, from the moment of her death to the present day, her name has been sullied, her story distorted, and her memoirs obliterated by men taking vengeance on a women who dared become Emperor. For the first time in thirteen centuries, Empress Wu flings open the gates of her Forbidden City and tells her own astonishing tale–revealing a fascinating, complex figure who in many ways remains modern to this day.

Empress: A Novel

Literature & Fiction

Sa, Shan

United States

Harper

Alexander and Alestria is the imaginative tale of the dramatic love affair between Alexander the Great and Alestria, queen of the Amazons, when both are at the height of their powers. Shan Sa, bestselling author of Empress, brings the familiar figure of Alexander the Great to new life, entwining his historical legacy with an imagined relationship that explores the compelling clash of western and eastern cultures.

Alexander & Alestria

British & Irish

A brilliant yet ruthless savage conqueror and poet exhilarated by the world's wonders, Alexander first meets Alestria on the battlefield—shocked to discover his adversary is female and mesmerized by her fierce, dazzling loveliness. At last, the legendary king has found his equal in this indomitable Amazon queen who has been taught since childhood to abhor men and repel all invaders. Alestria, in turn, cannot resist Alexander's strength and beauty, and they unite in deeply passionate, intensely problematic love—pursuing a remarkable destiny against a vast backdrop of warfare and political turmoil that stretches from Greece to Egypt, and across Persia, deep into the mysterious kingdoms of India. Acclaimed author Shan Sa brings Alexander the Great to richly imagined new life, entwining his historical legacy with a fantastic love affair set in a time of war between Western and Eastern civilizations.

Alexander and Alestria: A Novel

Harper-perennial

One of China's most controversial figures, Empress Wu was its first and only female emperor, emerging in the seventh century during the great Tang Dynasty to usher in a golden age. Throughout history, her name has been defamed and her story distorted. But now, after thirteen centuries, Empress Wu flings open the gates of the Forbidden City and tells her own astonishing tale—revealing a fascinating, complex figure who in many ways remains modern to this day. Writing with epic assurance, poetry, and vivid historic detail, Shan Sa plumbs the psychological and philosophical depths of what it means to be a striving mortal in a tumultuous, power-hungry world. Empress is a great literary feat and a revelation for the ages.

The Girl Who Played Go

Genre Fiction

Vintage

In a remote Manchurian town in the 1930s, a sixteen-year-old girl is more concerned with intimations of her own womanhood than the escalating hostilities between her countrymen and their Japanese occupiers. While still a schoolgirl in braids, she takes her first lover, a dissident student. The more she understands of adult life, however, the more disdainful she is of its deceptions, and the more she loses herself in her one true passion: the ancient game of go. Incredibly for a teenager–and a girl at that–she dominates the games in her town. No opponent interests her until she is challenged by a stranger, who reveals himself to us as a Japanese soldier in disguise. They begin a game and continue it for days, rarely speaking but deeply moved by each other’s strategies. As the clash of their peoples becomes ever more desperate and inescapable, and as each one’s untold life begins to veer wildly off course, the girl and the soldier are absorbed by only one thing–the progress of their game, each move of which brings them closer to their shocking fate. In The Girl Who Played Go, Shan Sa has distilled the piercing emotions of adolescence into an engrossing, austerely beautiful story of love, cruelty and loss of innocence. From the Hardcover edition.

Literary

Vintage Books

As the Japanese military invades 1930s Manchuria, a young girl approaches her own sexual coming of age. Drawn into a complex triangle with two boys, she distracts herself from the onslaught of adulthood by playing the game of go with strangers in a public square--and yet the force of desire, like the occupation, proves inevitable. Unbeknownst to the girl who plays go, her most worthy and frequent opponent is a Japanese soldier in disguise. Captivated by her beauty as much as by her bold, unpredictable approach to the strategy game, the soldier finds his loyalties challenged. Is there room on the path to war for that most revolutionary of acts: falling in love?

Girl Who Played Go

Contemporary

Demco Media

Set in Japanese occupied Manchuria in the 1930s, The Girl Who Played Go is harsher, more shocking than Balzac, a timeless tale of love and war reflected in the age-old game of go. In the Place of a Thousand Winds, snow falls as a sixteen-year-old Chinese girl beats all-comers at the game of go. One of her opponents is a young Japanese officer of the occupying power, rigidly militaristic, imbued with the imperial ethic, yet intrigued by this young opponent who plays like a man. Their encounters are like the game itself, restrained, subtle, surprisingly fierce. But as their two stories unfold, and the Chinese try to ignore their oppressors, the Japanese army moves inexorably through their huge land, in the vanguard of a greater war, leaving blood and destruction in its wake. Shan Sa's novel has a wonderful directness and deceptive simplicity that catches the reader by the throat, and makes the cruelty and tragedy of its outcome all the more shocking. An exquisite and unusual novel with strange twists on the Romeo and Juliet theme, The Girl Who Played Go is already a bestseller in France.

KNOPF

As the Japanese military invades 1930s Manchuria, a young girl approaches her own sexual coming of age. Drawn into a complex triangle with two boys, she distracts herself from the onslaught of adulthood by playing the game of go with strangers in a public square--and yet the force of desire, like the occupation, proves inevitable. Unbeknownst to the girl who plays go, her most worthy and frequent opponent is a Japanese soldier in disguise. Captivated by her beauty as much as by her bold, unpredictable approach to the strategy game, the soldier finds his loyalties challenged. Is there room on the path to war for that most revolutionary of acts: falling in love?

The Girl Who Played Go: A Novel

Born in an aristocratic family, a girl was kidnapped the day before her wedding by a captain of the imperial army and forced to follow his warfare without being able to see him. From the battlefields to the destroyed cities, she discovered the growing power of her husband and the changes of her life. Fallen into a world of hunger and disease, unexpectedly she was taken to the Forbidden City, then to the throne. She became the supreme empress of Southern China. Hundred years later, Shen Feng, a poor zither maker from the lowest class, broke into an imperial tomb and stole the precious sarcophagi. Back to his village, he started to carve a forgery of antique zither by using the sarcophagi wood. The ghost empress appeared to him and begged for his love. As the seven strings zither rattled and hummed, ancient cities, harbours, warriors, conspirators, poets, pirates flew out of the misty vastness of Yangtze River.

The ghost empress

Independently published

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Books by Sa, Shan

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Sa, Shan. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Empress: A Novel

Alexander & Alestria

Alexander and Alestria: A Novel

Empress: A Novel

The Girl Who Played Go

The Girl Who Played Go

Girl Who Played Go

The Girl Who Played Go

The Girl Who Played Go: A Novel

The ghost empress