Shanghai grand

I was attracted to this book because of my fascination with journalist and author Emily (Mickey) Hahn, but the book's scope reaches far beyond Hahn's life in Shanghai before and during WWII and the communist revolution. The history of Shanghai is also included, giving the story more context, along with at least brief histories of various places around the world associated with the two other main personalities of the book--Victor Sassoon, who owned the hotel of the title, and Zau Sinmay, Emily Hahn's Chinese lover.

This sounded like an enjoyable listen: cosmopolitan Shanghai in the 1930s, which I'd heard was a glamorous and exciting place. But Taras Grescoe's book lacks focus.