Description
Book Synopsis
A thrilling journey through China's dark criminal underworld, from a celebrated voice in Chinese literature
When Hongyang is found dead after a night of debauched drinking, it looks as if his reign of terror has finally come to an end.
Few in this insular community have much reason to mourn his passing: Hongyang is an infamous mob boss, a man with plenty of enemies. But now it seems that his years of crime have also earned him some very dangerous friends.
As his funeral draws near, those who knew him come together to look back on a life characterised by corruption, deceit and a flair for violence. Their recollections will keep Hongyang's legacy alive, with terrifying consequences.
From the master of Chinese noir fiction comes this explosive new novel about the power of one man, unravelled by a tangled web of secrets.
Trade Review'A Yi describes [power] in prose that flies at the reader like sparks from a knife being sharpened. But there's also exquisite precision… Nicky Harman's translation is superb, not a sentence out of place… It's tempting to view the book as A Yi's unflinching take on a moral vacuum at the heart of contemporary China, but he is also lowering his bucket into a much deeper well of delicious literary misanthropy.'
-- New Internationalist
