Bangkok

The entirety of the novel takes place in Thailand’s capital city, where author Lawrence Osborne also resides. Bangkok is portrayed as a place which an intense, natural landscape and climate, with its sweltering heat and monsoons. Osborne portrays the dark, gritty part of Bangkok, noting the city’s “avenues like discorded reliquary shops, the decay that held a dark human nectar inside of it” (37). The characters often discuss the underbelly of the city, a world of corruption, money laundering, and prostitution, and Sarah initially believes this makes it the perfect city to hide in as a con artist. Sarah, however, does not account for the political unrest that occurs during her time in the city. Osborne often contrasts the extreme wealth and extreme poverty within the city, and the class divide is exacerbated by the insurrection of the lower-class civilians against the authoritarian monarchy. While the lower-classes...