Home truths
Drawing on his privileged childhood memories, author Kevin Kwan dramatises the crazy lifestyles of rich Asians in his new book, writes Tiffany Ap
It's been described as Joy Luck Club meets Real Housewives or Gossip Girl with a dose of Jane Austen. Kevin Kwan's debut novel, Crazy Rich Asians, chronicles the lives of the Asian elite. Just three months after its publication, a Vogue excerpt and a Vanity Fair interview, Hunger Games producer Nina Jacobson signed on to adapt it for the big screen.
The book taps into the global curiosity about the nouveau riche in Asia. Americans in particular look at the rise of mainland wealth with a mix of fear and fascination.
Rich mainlanders are also an obsessive topic of discussion whenever they appear in Singapore and Hong Kong, where cutting comments are tinged with anxiety that China's vast size, numbers and rapidly expanding wealth will overtake us all.
Kwan's addictive story invites readers into the fictional world of three Singapore old money clans. Nick Young, the heir to one of the largest fortunes, has been living in New York with his overseas-Chinese girlfriend Rachel Chu. He asks Rachel to join him in Singapore for the summer to attend the wedding of his best friend.
Unaware of Nick's background, Rachel arrives and is thrown into the deep end of the city's scheming and gossip-crazy upper crust. It's a world of socialites named Astrid and Araminta who snap up fine jewellery as if they were macarons and fly on private planes equipped with yoga studios. The characters jet at a moment's notice to Indonesia, Australia and Macau, turning their noses up at the salaries of investment bankers.