Espionage, passion and battlefield peril: the fate of one remarkable family unfolds against the Second World War’s Pacific Theatre in Daniel Kalla’s spellbinding Nightfall Over Shanghai, the triumphant concluding volume in his Shanghai trilogy
It’s 1944. The Japanese are losing the war. But Shanghai is more dangerous than ever, particularly for the Adler family. After fleeing Nazi Europe, Dr. Franz Adler and his teenage daughter, Hannah, have adjusted to life in their strange adopted city, but they are now imprisoned in the Shanghai ghetto for refugee Jews.
Franz is compelled to work as a surgeon for the hated Japanese military, while Sunny, his beloved Eurasian wife and fellow surgeon, struggles to keep the city’s undersupplied refugee hospital functioning. When a mysterious injured man arrives at the hospital, Sunny is recruited into a spy ring, providing crucial strategic information to the Allies. Inadvertently, Hannah is also pulled into the perilous operation, just as she is drawn to the controversial but growing movement of Zionism. When the Japanese launch a major new offensive against the Chinese, Franz is sent inland to work on the frontlines as a field doctor. There, he must contend with his tangled loyalties, aerial bombings and his uncertain feelings for a vulnerable Canadian nurse.
In 1945, American B-52 bombings place all the city’s residents in grave danger. While the war seems to be winding down in the Far East, many questions remain unanswered for the Adlers. As the bombers circle ominously overhead, the family must now struggle for more than just safety. For the first time in many war-riven years, they now face the challenge and prospect of forging a hopeful path forward for the future. But first, they must find a way to survive.