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Rules for Virgins
Amy Tan


Shanghai, 1912: beautiful courtesans mercilessly compete for the patronage of wealthy gentlemen. For the women, the contest is deadly serious, a perilous game of economic survival that, if played well, can set them up for life as mistresses of the rich and prominent. There is no room for error, however: erotic power is hard to achieve and harder to maintain, especially in the loftiest social circles.Enter veteran seducer, Magic Gourd, formerly one of Shanghai’s “Top Ten Beauties” and now the advisor and attendant of Violet, an aspiring but inexperienced courtesan. Violet may have the youth and the allure, but Magic Gourd has the cunning and the knowledge without which the younger woman is sure to fail. These ancient tricks of the trade aren’t written down, though; to pass them on to her student, Magic Gourd must reach back into her own professional past, bringing her lessons alive with stories and anecdotes from a career spent charming and manipulating men who should have known better but rarely did.The world of sexual intrigue that Tan reveals in ‘Rules for Virgins’ actually existed once, and she spares no detail in recreating it. But this story is more than intriguing (and sometimes shocking) historical literary fiction. The wisdom conveyed is ancient, specific, and timeless, exposing the workings of vanity and folly, calculation and desire that define the mysterious human heart.









Rules for Virgins

Amy Tan








Contents

The Valley of Amazement (#u76ae2129-7461-52c7-a7c5-c02c3a1f1f54)

Rules for Virgins (#uf30460b3-fd3b-5bbb-934f-40e2e8b6f4f9)

About the Author (#u3e0a7275-5491-5d80-b2fa-072c724d4893)

By the Same Author (#u7f2f8bf3-c4e3-5774-ad74-ef8e7740fc6b)

Links (#ufae23e8b-91a9-50a2-9c7d-ce43a40a9ddd)

Copyright (#uc0c27627-7e75-50f4-b713-fe2c1bb1acab)

About the Publisher (#u0893d681-7526-5fec-a2ef-0441ef21bdf4)




The Valley of Amazement


‘Rules for Virgins’ is adapted from Amy Tan’s novel, The Valley of Amazement, published by Fourth Estate in October 2013.






A painting called The Valley of Amazement is passed along through three generations of women of the same family. Despite vast differences in their upbringing, culture and circumstances, each of the women is drawn to discover the meaning of the painting and the unknown history of her mother. The story begins in San Francisco in the 1880s when Lucia Hoggs meets a young Chinese painter. She follows him to Shanghai but parts ways with him, and, out of necessity, becomes a courtesan.

A decade later, Daisy, Lucia’s twelve-year-old daughter by the painter, is separated from her mother, who has boarded a boat sailing to San Francisco, and is sold into a brothel as a virgin courtesan. She rises to become one the ‘Ten Beauties of Shanghai’. After her career declines, she marries and leaves Shanghai. But when a fire devastates the village and kills her husband seven years later, she is blamed and banished to an alpine valley in Heaven Mountain, a once-holy place now said to be cursed.

Fourteen years later and Daisy’s daughter, Rose, has been adopted by a couple from the Hudson Valley in New York, and is now an American journalist. An old woman comes to her while she is staying Shanghai, claiming she was her mother Daisy’s maid, and that she has safeguarded her mother's possessions and now wants to sell them to Rose. One item is a painting of the Valley of Amazement landscape. There is a second painting – of an American woman. On the back is an inscription in English, ‘For Miss Hoggs from Pei Lu Shing. Dark with excessive bright’. Ultimately, Rose will confront the truth that ties these three generations of women to each other …




Rules for Virgins


Wherein Magic Gourd advises young Violet on how to become a popular courtesan while avoiding cheapskates, false love, and suicide

Shanghai

1912




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