At the Edge of Empire

A Family's Reckoning with China

Author  Edward Wong
At the Edge of Empire

One of The Washington Post’s 50 Notable Nonfiction Books of 2024

“A sprawling, complex morality tale, sweeping us along.” —The Wall Street Journal

“In telling this personal story about family memory, exile and return, the book also takes in the breadth of [China’s] evolution during the 20th century.” —The Washington Post

“This book’s power comes from Wong’s broad sense of the patterns of Chinese history, reflected in the lives of a father and son, and from his ability to toggle effortlessly between the epic and the intimate.” —Gal Beckerman, The Atlantic

“Edward Wong’s exquisite family chronicle achieves a level of humane illumination that only one of America’s finest reporters on China could deliver. In tracing his father’s journey—from Hong Kong to Xinjiang to…