Azalea Dreams, Bamboo Lives tells the story of Siok Yi and Kok Wah, who grew up amidst the promise of a new China on Gulangyu island during the tumultuous years of the Chinese civil war. Condemned and persecuted for living their ideals, they elope to the colony of Singapore, hoping to build a new world for themselves. Haunted by the ghosts they left behind and faced with the same challenges they thought they had escaped, they find themselves caught in a web of intrigue and deceit, as they struggle to keep their dreams and love alive in a world at war. This sweeping work of historical fiction brings alive the emotions of that turbulent era, when great powers and ideologies tussled for control, inflicting unimaginable costs on the denizens of a Singapore slowly moving towards independence.