THE BINDING CHAIR

An engrossing tale contrasting the lives of a young Caucasian and her Chinese stepaunt.

Harrison is a powerful, hypnotic writer fascinated by the psychosexual elements of a secretive human life. Her latest effort is skilled in incorporating themes from her earlier fiction—and from her life as well, it would seem, as revealed in The Kiss (1997), the memoir of her consensual sexual relationship with her father. Like Poison (1995), this novel is set in a historical period (the first half of the 20th century) and an exotic locale (Shanghai), and, like all of Harrison’s books (Exposure, 1993, etc.), it examines how women get and use sexual and social power. The first of the two contrasting but intertwined stories focuses on May, a Chinese-born woman whose traditional foot-binding ceremony is recalled in vivid and horrifying detail. The second follows May’s step-niece, Alice, through adolescent sexual awakening. While both are strong, forceful women—who clash accordingly—May’s life makes for the more compelling drama. Addicted to opium for years, and hobbled by the foot-binding, she is a fierce character who never becomes a clich‚d “dragon lady.” Particularly gripping are the portrayals of her abusive first marriage and of her convention-defying second try with Alice’s uncle Arthur. Harrison deals subtly with the themes of racism and anti-Semitism (Arthur’s and Alice’s families are Jewish) even when constructing so obvious a set-piece as the scene in which May is arrested at London’s Fortnum & Mason for using “slaves” to carry her around. In a book distinguished by atmospheric backdrops and panoramic scope, two additional pleasures stand out: an abundance of full-bodied minor characters, and a sharply telling portrait of expatriate Westerners getting rich in the East.

A deft weaving together of sexuality and the macabre into a rich fictional tapestry.