Queen Victoria's Secret

"A highly intelligent drug dealer, exiled by a time machine to the late Qing Dynasty and named 'Downing Windsor,' embarks on a journey from China to London and then to the world. This book narrates his rise and adventures across continents.

'Build a dream of marble, white jade, bronze, and porcelain, with cedar for beams, draped in satin and adorned with jewels… Raise a temple here, a harem there, place idols, mythical beasts, embellished with glaze, gold, and powder. Let the architect-poet construct a vision of a thousand and one nights—one thousand and one dreams. Add gardens, pools, fountains… Imagine a human dreamland, its appearance like a palace, like a temple…'

The French literary master Victor Hugo described this earthly paradise as the Garden of Perfect Fortune—known as the Old Summer Palace.

'If a man is tired of London, he must be tired of life,' said Samuel Johnson."