Her Lotus Year
China, the Roaring Twenties, and the Making of Wallis Simpson
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Narrated by:
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Laurel Lefkow
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By:
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Paul French
About this listen
New York Times bestselling author Paul French examines a controversial and revealing period in the early life of the legendary Wallis, Duchess of Windsor—her one year in China.
Before she was the Duchess of Windsor, Bessie Wallis Warfield was Mrs. Wallis Spencer, wife of Earl “Win” Spencer, a US Navy aviator. From humble beginnings in Baltimore, she rose to marry a man who gave up his throne for her. But what made Wallis Spencer, Navy Wife, the woman who could become the Duchess of Windsor? The answers lie in her one-year sojourn in China.
In her memoirs, Wallis described her time in China as her “Lotus Year,” referring to Homer’s Lotus Eaters, a group living in a state of dreamy forgetfulness, never to return home. Though faced with challenges, Wallis came to appreciate traditional Chinese aesthetics. China molded her in terms of her style and provided her with friendships that lasted a lifetime. But that “Lotus Year” would also later be used to damn her in the eyes of the British Establishment.
The British government’s supposed “China Dossier” of Wallis’s rumored amorous and immoral activities in the Far East was a damning concoction, portraying her as sordid, debauched, influenced by foreign agents, and unfit to marry a king. Instead, French, an award-winning China historian, reveals Wallis Warfield Spencer as a woman of tremendous courage who may have acted as a courier for the US government, undertaking dangerous undercover diplomatic missions in a China torn by civil war.
Her Lotus Year is an untold story in the colorful life of a woman too often maligned by history.
A Macmillan Audio production from St. Martin's Press
©2024 Paul French (P)2024 Macmillan AudioCritic reviews
"Where does an unhappily married woman go in 1924 to seek peace of mind? To China, for adventure and glamour. What happens to her after this mysterious “lotus year”? She becomes none other than the Duchess of Windsor. A fascinating and very fun read."–Lisa See, New York Times bestselling author of Lady Tan's Circle of Women and Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
"Riveting and fascinating, Paul French has put flesh on the bones in his detailed account of what Wallis really did in her ‘Lotus Year.'"–Anne Sebba, New York Times bestselling author of That Woman
“I thought there was nothing left to learn about the Duchess of Windsor. But Paul French has proven me wrong in this book of fascinating revelations.”–Laurence Leamer, New York Times bestselling author of Capote’s Women
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- Length: 9 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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No one present at the Battle of Cape Lopez off the coast of West Africa in 1722 could have known that they were on the edge of history. This obscure yet fierce naval battle would have a monumental impact on British colonies and the future of slavery in America.
By: Angela C. Sutton
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City of Devils
- The Two Men Who Ruled the Underworld of Old Shanghai
- By: Paul French
- Narrated by: Paul Chan
- Length: 9 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Shanghai, 1930s; it was a haven for outlaws from all over the world: a place where pasts could be forgotten, fascism and communism outrun, names invented, and fortunes made - and lost. “Lucky” Jack Riley was the most notorious of those outlaws. An ex-US Navy boxing champion, he escaped from prison and rose to become the Slots King of Shanghai. “Dapper” Joe Farren - a Jewish boy who fled Vienna’s ghetto - ruled the nightclubs. This is the story of their rise to power, their downfall, and the trail of destruction left in their wake.
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Very hard to listen to
- By Terrance D. Harps on 07-26-18
By: Paul French
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Didion and Babitz
- By: Lili Anolik
- Narrated by: Lili Anolik, Emma Roberts
- Length: 12 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Could you write what you write if you weren’t so tiny, Joan? —Eve Babitz, in a letter to Joan Didion, 1972. Joan Didion, revealed at last… Eve Babitz died on December 17, 2021. Found in the wrack, ruin, and filth of her apartment, a stack of boxes packed by her mother decades before. The boxes were pristine, the seals of duct tape unbroken. Inside, a lost world. This world turned for a certain number of years in the late sixties and early seventies, and centered on a two-story rental in a down-at-heel section of Hollywood.
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Fascinating and escapist listen
- By Alyssa on 11-17-24
By: Lili Anolik
What listeners say about Her Lotus Year
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- SW
- 11-21-24
The narration makes me wish I had bought the actual book
In my opinion, any book about the Duchess of Windsor is a decadent peek into a world many of us will never experience. I am early into the book, and the author has already painted vivid tableaus of the places Wallis went. We have been on a navy transport ship and traveled up a mountainside in China. We’ve smelled the colorful flowers, seen the vermin, sailed the waters and consumed cocktails by the bay. All things that could have been elevated to an even higher level of a tremendous sensory journey, if not for the halting reading of the narrator. Pauses in the middle of sentences and an uneven cadence make this audiobook almost unpleasant to listen to and, ultimately, very disappointing.
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