[1] Lee's writing is known for blending traditional Chinese, supernatural and everyday Hong Kong elements into her narratives.
Her works, Rouge, Farewell My Concubine, and Green Snake, were adapted for films in the 1980s and 1990s, giving her greater international visibility.
With the exception of Farewell My Concubine and Kawashima Yoshiko, most of her books have yet to be translated from Chinese into English or made widely available.
Her wealthy paternal grandfather had four wives and passed the family business of traditional Chinese medicine to her father.
Lee often adapts elements of early Chinese vernacular literature and the supernatural, to retell a well-known theme or story from an underdog perspective.
In Rouge, the main character Fleur, who worked in one of Hong Kong's "flower houses," and comes back to life 50 years later to be reunited with her lover Chan Chen-Pang whom she involved in a double suicide.