A Case of Two Cities, Qiu Xiaolong

This is the fourth book from Qiu Xiaolong involving his star character, Chief Inspector Chen Cao. I have greatly enjoyed the series. There are a few things that bothered me about this volume. In perhaps the first 1/3-1/2 of the novel, I was bothered by bad grammar and bad grammar choices. By bad grammar, I mean run on sentences and sentence fragments. Bad grammar choices involved far too many commas creating a jerky narrative. Together, these two issues almost made me hit the delete on my Kindle. One of the style choices I didn't like in the first three books was the inclusion of poetry lines jammed together like prose, separated by the forward slash /. I suppose he might have saved a few pages and a few trees by doing so. But in an electronic copy, what's the point? In any case, that was improved upon perhaps 50%+ of the time. That is to say, in volume four, maybe greater than 50% of the time the lines of poetry were on their own lines as poetry ought to be displayed.

The story itself is otherwise fairly well told. But, while not really an issue I guess, I didn't get a very good look into China. Most of the story takes place in the US. There was the issue of corrupt people stealing Chinese public funds or taking advantage of Chinese laws meant to stimulate the economy to give themselves leverage they needed to create vast sums of personal wealth, in order to build luxurious lives for themselves in the US before their corruption caught up with them.

Chen is given 'the emperor's sword' to deal with going after Xiao. But he doesn't get far, and there is a great deal of risk to him. One detective who may have been assigned to the same file was killed. The first person he questions has information about Chen before Chen has had a chance to question him. The target becomes too dangerous for him, so the next person he goes after for questioning he gets the leverage of some pornographic photos with another official, Jiang. She ends up dead in short order. Then, Chen is sent to the US to get him out of the way or to make it possible to get a roundabout inroad towards the defecting Xiao. But he goes not for the investigation, but as a special envoy. Perhaps a kind of undercover operation where everyone knows who he is, but not exactly why he is there. This includes himself. Someone tries to kill him, but gets someone else instead.

In the end, he attempts to thwart Jiang's escape to Canada, but the outcome is left out. The end of the narrative has many loose strings. I don't object to that entirely. But I suspect many readers might. Loose strings are easier to pick up later than a narrative which is carefully and surgically sutured to have no loose ends.

I'm sure I'll get into book 5. My theory is that this book had a different editor than the first four. I tried to find out by looking up the book on Amazon and Goodreads. But getting that information isn't so easy. I'm sure if I spent more time I could eventually figure it out. But how important is it? I'll just leave my guess here.

Goodreads first three or four reviews had similar experiences to my own: enjoyed the first three novels. This novel is of inferior quality.

Cheyanne wrote, "But this case has two many murders, with victims and killers we barely get to know. We also get barely a glimpse of several recurring characters."Shabbeer Hassan wrote, "A rather disappointing book in the Inspector Chen series, with a weak story (as usual) but much weaker character motivations and horrid pastiche of Inspector Morse by Colin Dexter.

I don't know who Inspector Morse or Colin Dexter are. 

Orinoco Womble (tidy bag and all) wrote, "Golly I hate to say this, but I was disappointed. Four novels into the Chen Cao chronicles, I guess it's normal that the author should lose a bit of headway. The case looked promising: an older, respected cop is found dead in a fancy brothel, and Internal Security gets a "confession" from the terrified young prostitute far too quickly. What's up? Well, you won't find out here."

There were some positive reviews. Follow the links and I'm sure you'll find them at Goodreads.  

When Red is Black, Qiu Xiaolong

   This is the third novel in a series about Chief Police Inspector Chen. Chen is on holiday for most of this book, and only marginally involved with it as he's on a holiday. He leaves the case mostly to his sidekick, Sergeant Yu.
   The takeaway for me from this book is the fact that Mao had a way of betraying his most ardent followers. The Red Guard which is created by him becomes politically incorrect. So, all those people that the Red Guard identified as being anti-Mao, or something to that effect, themselves become persecuted.
   Another issue that becomes apparent is that an honest policeman in the 90s quickly got left behind the economic boom which came after the government, under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping, decided to open up the country to capitalism. He was a victim of that Reagonomics trickle down theory whereby if people are allowed to become very rich, the money that they make will trickle down to the poor and everyone gets richer. I think that's BS now. Clearly that's not what's happening today. But, millions of people were able to live themselves above poverty. But I think that this is the result of opportunity rather than trickle down effects.
   What I really like about Qiu Xiaolong's books is reading a lot of the backstories that build up the present who-dun-nit. The meeting of the murdered woman and a poet in a reeducation facility makes these politically black people into greater astigmatism. For refusing to end the relationship, half of her head is shaved, and she has to wear an old shoe around her neck. While he is forced to wear a tiny chalkboard around his neck.
   Publisher's Weekly writes, "Only a banal solution to the mystery spoils an otherwise engrossing read." I agree that the ending is a bit banal. But I don't think that's a problem. The ending is a bit simplistic and a bit of an oddball, nothing fancy. But I don't think that that's really a problem with my reading of the novel. The more important story is how major historical events which become little more than notes on timelines create an endless tapestry of events which lead to an unfortunate end for an unfortunate victim.
   I enjoyed the book and look forward to reading the next in the series.

A Loyal Character Dancer, Qiu Xiaolong

   This is the second in a series of novels about Chief Inspector Chen by Qiu Xiaolong. I was very pleased with the first novel in this series. Qiu Xiaolong is a remarkable writer. Consider that he did not spend the first 40 years of his life in the US. Further, he teaches English in the US. These novels of his were written in English, not translated from his native Mandarin into English. That is quite respectable alone. But it is not enough to make me want to read these stories. Yet, here I am, fascinated and addicted to the characters, the setting, the romance built into these.
    This book surrounds a murder and a disappearance. One man is mysteriously murdered and his corpse left in a park. The woman who has disappeared, the loyal character dancer, is of intense interest by both the underground mafia, and the American government, who has sent a special marshal, Catherine Rohn, to retrieve the woman, Wen Liping, who has disappeared.
   The Americans want her because she is a part of an agreement which is contingent for a man, her husband, in the US, to testify against some major mafia figures. But the whole affair is much more complex than it appears.
   The book is set in the late 80s, but it is affected by events that had happened in the 60s. In the 60s, Mao sent China's educated youth to the countryside to learn how to work like peasants. Wen, being a young woman in this period, is particularly beautiful, and becomes a victim to a local magistrate's influence. He wants her, so he takes her against her will. He marries her. He beats her. He cheats on her. She is subjected to debilitating work. Her life was one of misery. So, when the call came for her to go to the US to rejoin him, she could hardly be blamed for not wanting to go to him. But, the politics of the situation is too great for her to ignore.
   She had managed to find a place to hide. But, eventually Chen is able to unravel her whereabouts. He eventually convinces her that the mafia has connections everywhere, and that eventually they will find his report which identifies where she is located. When she is located, her benefactor will suffer the consequences for having harbored her. So, eventually she agrees, though Catherine is able to promise to her that she will not be forced to stay with her husband.
   Chen is very wary. Despite being romantic, he is also quite paranoid. He pays attention and is savvy. He knows he is being watched, and that he has enemies. He doesn't really trust anyone except his trusty sidekick and his sidekick's father, referred to as Old Hunter.
   I really enjoyed this novel. I recommend it. I will be reading the third in this series probably within a month.