The Headmaster's Wager - Softcover

Lam, Vincent

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0385661460 ISBN 13: 9780385661461

Publisher: ANCHOR CANADA, 2013

Synopsis

The headmaster of the most respected English school in Saigon, Percival Chen is also a bon vivant, a compulsive gambler and an incorrigible womanizer. Fiercely proud of his Chinese heritage, and quick to spot the business opportunities rife in a divided country, Percival devotedly ignores all news of the fighting that swirls around him, choosing instead to read the faces of his opponents at high-stakes mahjong tables.

When his only son gets in trouble with the Vietnamese authorities, Percival faces the limits of his connections and wealth and is forced to send him away. In the loneliness that follows, Percival finds solace in Jacqueline, a beautiful woman of mixed French and Vietnamese heritage. But Percival's new-found happiness is precarious, and as the complexities of war encroach further and further into his world, he must confront the tragedy of all he has refused to see.

About this title

Review:

"I love this book's vivid realization and its deft weave of conspiracies. I especially admire Lam's ability to transport a reader. . . . A colourful, suspenseful depiction of Chinese living in Vietnam during the war."
--The Globe and Mail

"Lam marshals his characters with humor, suspense, and tenderness as the fall of Saigon looms. Even as Percival navigates the minefield of shifting ideologies, treachery, and paranoia--incurring one inconceivable cost upon another--his devotion suffuses every page. Lam depicts a world caught in an implacable cycle of violence, leavened only by the grace of a father's love."
--Publisher's Weekly

"The Headmaster's Wager does what only the very best literature can do: it provides characters you care about deeply (even as they break your heart) and has plot twists you don't see coming but then couldn't imagine any other way. Vincent Lam has written a mature and rewarding novel of the highest quality, and Percival Chen will remain with you long after the final page. This is an exceptional book."
--Andrew Davidson, author of The Gargoyle

About the Author:

Vincent Lam is from the expatriate Chinese community of Vietnam. Trained in Toronto, he was an emergency physician for thirteen years. He is now an addictions medicine physician, the Medical Director of the Coderix Medical Clinic, and a lecturer at the University of Toronto. Lam's debut, a collection of short stories called Bloodletting & Miraculous Cures, won the 2006 Scotiabank Giller Prize. His bestselling novel, The Headmaster's Wager, was a finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award for Fiction in 2012. He is also the co-author of The Flu Pandemic and You, which received an award from the American Medical Writers Association in 2007, and author of a biography of Tommy Douglas, published as part of the Extraordinary Canadians series. Lam and his family live in Toronto.

About this edition

• Publisher: ANCHOR CANADA
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 0385661460
• ISBN 13: 9780385661461
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 448