By Jay Scott Kanes

HONG KONG – Career choices reveal much. When a woman teaches English, then becomes a librarian and finally an author, we can assume that words and literature played big roles in her life.

Knowing that Elsie Sze took such a career path, I attended her recent speaking appearance at the Hong Kong Foreign Correspondents Club. Elsie’s two books, The Heart of the Buddha (2009, Emerald Book Company, United States), and Hui Gui: A Chinese Story (2005, BTS Publishing House, Canada) both earned favorable reviews.

“My three professions have been related,” said Elsie, who grew up in Hong Kong, but has spent most of her adult life as a resident of Toronto. “They’re all about working with books, especially my nine years at the Toronto Public Libraries. Being among books, I found it easy to do research. When no patrons were around, I could grab the books or go online to research everything about what I wanted to write.”

What favorite books influenced Elsie? “I like the oldies best,” she said. “Actually, I mentioned Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte, in The Heart of the Buddha. It’s a favorite that I’ve read many times.

“When I love a book, I even will go to the important places and learn how people like Bronte and her sisters lived back then (in the early 1800s). I went to the Yorkshire moors to find the parsonage of the Bronte sisters.

“I also like Charles Dickens, who’s mentioned in my book too,” Elsie said. “I’ve read more recent things too, like The Kite Runner (by Khaled Hosseini). They’re very good, but I most remember the older books.”

Travel experiences affect Elsie as well. “My main thing is writing about other countries, not where I live,” she said.

The Heart of the Buddha takes readers to Bhutan, a Himalayan kingdom that Elsie enjoys visiting. Her first book, Hui Gui, focuses on Hong Kong, where she grew up, but that’s still an exotic spot to North American readers.

Elsie has started a third novel, this time set in Borneo, her father’s home turf. “It was British when he grew up,” she said. “Now it’s part of Malaysia. I’ve been there a few times.”

Reading Elsie’s prose should encourage folks to treasure two widely available sources of enrichment -- good books and new places. It matters little if the books are thick or thin, if the places are nearby or across the planet.


Emily Bronte, seen here in a portrait,
inspires readers and other authors.


Charles Dickens gets a mention too.



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