Beila (her pseudonym), a female writer from Shanghai, has just finished her new novel, The Magic Piano, which is a romance based on the stories of Jews living in exile in Shanghai during the Second World War.

The book will be available at the 17th National Book Fair in Chongqing. The background of the book is the anti-fascist war in China, telling a story of a piano and the love between Li Mei, a Chinese Red Army orphan and a Jewish Pole pianist.

Beila had been living in Canada, and she returned to Shanghai to draw materials for her novel. She visited Shanghai Moses Guild Hall, and the Jewish Memorial Hall in the city to acquaint herself with the situation at that time. She even planned a trip to Vienna, to interview the descendants of the Jews who once stayed in Shanghai.

"Shanghai offered shelter to some 30,000 Jews during the war, and I am proud to write a novel based on that part of history as a Shanghainese," said Beila.

Beila plans to release her second novel of the same topic by the end of 2007.

(Chinanews April 27, 2007)