City of Devils: The Two Men Who Ruled the Underworld of Old Shanghai

By Paul French

Now one of Kirkus Reviews' "Best Books of the Year"

From Paul French, the New York Times bestselling author of Midnight in Peking—winner of both the Edgar Award for Best Fact Crime and the CWA Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction—comes City of Devils, a rags-to-riches tale of two self-made men set against a backdrop of crime and vice in the sprawling badlands of Shanghai.

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–U.S. 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. His chorus lines rivaled Ziegfeld’s.

In 1940, Lucky Jack and Dapper Joe bestrode the Shanghai Badlands like kings, while all around the Solitary Island was poverty, starvation, and war. They thought they ruled Shanghai, but the city had other ideas. This is the story of their rise to power, their downfall, and the trail of destruction left in their wake. Shanghai was their playground for a flickering few years, a city where for a fleeting moment even the wildest dreams could come true.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Jul 3, 2018
• ISBN: 9781250170606

Paul French

Born in West London, Paul French first sought military adventure in the County of London Yeomanry and then 21 SAS (V). Here, Paul discovered a yearning for hard work and arduous duty. A subsequent defence contract took him to Abu Dhabi where he learnt of Rhodesia and its attractions. Holidaying in Rhodesia, Paul took the opportunity to join the Rhodesian Army, serving with the renowned Rhodesian SAS and Selous Scouts. In 1980, Paul moved to the South African Defence Force, joining its elite 6 Reconnaissance Commando. Upon leaving the SADF a career in private security followed. An accomplished skydiver, Paul has thousands of jumps to his credit, and still jumps today. Married to Petah, Paul has three children. He continues to work in the security industry and now lives in the South-west of England. Shadows of A Forgotten Past is his first book.

Reviews for City of Devils

[loraineo_8 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Detailed look at crime in Shanghai during the 1930-1940's. Drugs, gambling , murder, prostitution and more. Focusing on the rise and fall of Jack Riley and Joe Farren. Well written.

[ericcostello-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A curious and interesting book. It's actually fiction, though it appears to be based quite heavily on real events of inter-war Shanghai, with real people. The book contains a number of seemingly authentic newspaper clippings and the like. The principal characters are a European Jew who develops a sparkling nightclub, complete with dancers, and a tough American, an escaped ex-con, who becomes, for a brief time, king of the slots in Shanghai. Needless to say, it doesn't end well for many characters, and that's even before the Japanese get involved. Recommended for sheer atmosphere.

[datrappert · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I have read a lot of books about Shanghai since I first lived there in 1989, and this is one of the two best (along with Georges Spunt's A Place in Time). French takes us to pre-WW2 Shanghai and gives us a ringside seat as it begins to disintegrate under the pressure of drugs, crime, and then--far worse--the Japanese invasion of China. But of course, Shanghai has always been, and still is, about money. And there was money to be made by the bucketful if you didn't mind putting aside morals--not that those were a popular thing in Shanghai. The story centers on two men, Jack Riley, and Joe Farren, both of whom had little choice but to make it in Shanghai if they were going to make it anywhere. Riley had been an American sailor in the Far East and knocked about its cities, including Shanghai, which was the biggest and baddest of the lot. After returning stateside and ending up in an Oklahoma prison for a 25-year stretch, he managed to walk away after two years, and under his new name of Riley, found his way back to Shanghai where he worked himself up to being the king of the city's slot machines, raking in thousands of dollars nightly. There was no way he was going back to America.Farren's background was less shady. He was a dancer, who with his partner and wife, Nelly, became the toast of Shanghai, leading to his creation of one string of dancing beauties (mostly White Russian refugees) after another. Eventually, he became the owner of night clubs, but the real money there was in gambling, and that is where his partnership with Riley was born. And because Farren was Jewish, and his Austrian homeland became part of Hitler's Germany, he had no place to go either. So even as bombs fell on Shanghai and thousands died violently or froze to death in the streets, even as those with places to go boarded ships and steamed down the Huangpu to safety, Riley and Farren and a host of others stayed on, still looking to make a buck, even if more and more of what they made had to be paid to the Japanese secret police or in other forms of "taxes". There are many other memorable characters, including a mysterious American marshal, a crime-busing federal Elliot Ness-wannabe, and club owners of all nationalities. Through French's vivid writing, we come to know them all. Some are more benign than others--but everyone has an angle that involves making money. The forces of the law are a bit overmatched.Amazingly, French writes most of the book in first person, and it works brilliantly. It is the most immediate story about those days in Shanghai I have ever read. Details about some of the events and personalities involved are missing, and he freely admits to filling in the gaps, so the book, despite a lack of dialogue, reads more like a novel--one of the best ones you have ever read.My caveat is that if you haven't read about the history of Shanghai, or perhaps even had the good fortune to live there, a lot of this will just seem confusing and chaotic. While French sketches in some of the background info, this is not a scholarly work of history. Rather, it is a total immersion in a time and place that was perhaps unique. I simply can't imagine it being done any better than French does it here. At times when reading this, I would just set it down for a second and marvel that not only was it one of the best books about Shanghai; it was simply one of the best books I had ever read. That judgment still holds.The long epilogue tries to tie up a few loose ends, but given who these characters were, that is a futile task in many cases. The book also includes a cross-reference of the old names of Shanghai streets in the days of the International Settlement and the French Concession with their modern-day names, which will be of interest to those who know Shanghai.This is simply a brilliant achievement. Please give it a try.

[fastforward-46127 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

It's the 1930s and 40s and Jack Riley and “Dapper” Joe Farren are big players in Shanghai's seedy underworld. American Jack Riley escaped prison and came to Shanghai and now runs a gambling empire. “Dapper” Joe Farren, originally from Vienna, finds his way to Shanghai with dancing and romantic partner, Nellie, and eventually rules the nightclubs. But it's hard to remain on top especially when you live a life of crime and people are looking to bring you down. So while the book certainly focused on the two men, it was also a nice little history of Shanghai during the 1930s and 1940s. I much preferred the first half of the book which was about Jack and Joe's rise to power rather than the other half which was more about their downfall. There were quite a few people to keep track of and I wish the author would have included a reference page for that instead of a glossary of terms. Overall, while the story of Jack and Joe with the backdrop of Shangahi is interesting, I wouldn't say it is must read unless you are specifically interested in nonfiction from this time period and location. I won a free copy of this book in a giveaway but was under no obligation to post a review. All views expressed are my honest opinion.