This is a biography of a nobody that offers a window into an otherwise closed world. It is a life which manages to touch us all.' empire made me shanghai in the wake of the First World War was one of the world's most dyn...This is a biography of a nobody that offers a window into an otherwise closed world. It is a life which manages to touch us all.' empire made me shanghai in the wake of the First World War was one of the world's most dynamic, brutal and exciting cities - an incredible panorama of nightclubs, opium-dens, gambling and murder.