Shanghai Shadows (review)

The Shpanns are among the lucky ones, at least if avoiding probable annihilation is an adequate definition of good luck; the Jewish family has the means and the will to leave their comfortable life in Vienna in 1939 and make their way to Shanghai, where a multinational community of emigrants, refugees, and expatriates of all stripes has been established under a reasonably tolerant Chinese regime. Quarters are cramped, work is hard to come by, especially for gifted violinist Mr. Shpann, and news trickling in from Europe is disquieting, to say the least, but Ilse and her parents and brother Erich are simply relieved to be far from the coming war. With Japan's entry into hostilities, however, the war manages to find them, as the Shanghai Jews face an increasing number of restrictions that finally culminate in enclosure in a ghetto, near total loss of job opportunity, and the now real possibilities of disease and starvation. The Shpanns are also plagued with a peculiar complication—Mrs. Shpann is disclosed by the authorities to be an "enemy" alien, technically still married to an American whom she never officially divorced after leaving him decades earlier, and she is sent to an internment camp. Narrator Ilse relates how the family fares from their arrival in 1939 until their post-war departure for America, making do under increasingly repressive conditions, dealing with the fallout from the bombshell about her mother's past, and feeling both guilty and grateful to have escaped the fate of their compatriots back home. Ilse is a believable character, healthy and resilient enough to weather physical hardship, naïve enough to flirt with resistance activities as a boredom-busting lark, savvy enough to work the system when her mother and brother are desperate for aid, and teenager enough to eke friendships and even a bit of romance out of her situation. Here is an underexplored corner of World War II that historical-fiction buffs will definitely want to examine.