Bøger af Qiu Xiaolong

Now a BBC Radio 4 Drama Series.When Chief Inspector Chen Cao is offered a week's break at a luxurious resort near Lake Tai, he accepts immediately. Increasingly worn out by the politics of his job, the opportunity to relax and recover sounds like heaven. But the beautiful lake he remembers is much changed: covered by algae, its waters have been polluted by waste from local manufacturing plants. Even the local food is dangerous to eat. Is this the cost of progress in the new China?Then his holiday is fatally disturbed: the boss of one of the most polluting businesses has been murdered and the leader of a local ecological group is the prime suspect. Inspector Chen must tread carefully if he is to uncover the truth behind the death and find justice for both the victim and the accused.

In this collection I have included some of the poems written in the last three or four years, a period in which I have been busy working on novels and translations, and making frequent trips to China. That's how the collection comes, in three parts. The poems in the first part, Lines out of China, were written in the United States. As for the second part, Lines in China, I wrote some during my trips there and rewrote in English, some I had written years earlier in Chinese. The third part, Cathay Revisited, resulted from my dialogue with classical Chinese poets in the translation of their works.

The poems in the present collection are compiled chronologically. Some of them have appeared-either entirely or partially-in the Chen novels, but with his writing in a hurry under the stress of the job, he usually takes time later to revise them, so the poems here may show difference, sometimes substantial, from the original versions. And some of them, either written in his pre-inspector days, or conceived in fragments only in his mind, now appear for the first time in the collection here.

Chief Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Department is often assigned cases considered politically "sensitive," and now the Minister of Public Security insists that Chen personally take on a 'special assignment.' Leery of international embarrassment, the party is concerned about rumors related to Chairman Mao. Jiao, the granddaughter of an actress who had a 'special relationship' to Mao has moved into a luxury apartment and become involved with a new social set centered around the remnants of pre-Communist Shanghai society. All without any visible means of support.Worried that Jiao has inherited some sort of artifact that could prove damaging to Mao's reputation, Chen has been given a few short days to infiltrate her social circle, determine if the feared material exists and, if it does, retrieve it quietly. And if he fails to solve this 'Mao case,' the consequences will be unpleasant for all concerned.

A serial killer is stalking the young women of Shanghai. The killer's calling card is to leave the victims' bodies in well trafficked locations, each of them redressed in a red mandarin dress. With the newspapers screaming about Shanghai's first serial killer, Party officials anxious for a quick resolution, and the police under pressure from all sides, something has to give. Chief Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Department, a rising party cadre, is often put in charge of politically senstive cases. But this time, there's a catch-Chen is on leave, ostensibly to study for his Master's degree, but also to sidestep being dragged into a messy corruption case with political overtones. But when the murderer strikes directly at the investigative team itself, Chen must take over the investigation himself discovering that this, his most dangerous and sensitive case to date, has roots that reach back to the country's tumultuous recent past.

At once a compelling crime novel and an insightful, moving portrayal of contemporary China, A Case of Two Cities is the finest novel yet in this critically-acclaimed, award-wining series.Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Department is assigned a high-profile anti-corruption case, one in which the principal figure has long since fled to the United States and beyond the reach of the Chinese government. But Xing left behind his organization, and Chen, while assigned to root the co-conspirators, is not sure whether he's actually being set up to fail.In a twisting case that takes him from Shanghai all the way to the U.S., reuniting him with his colleague and counterpart from the U.S. Marshall's Service, Inspector Catherine Rhon, Chen finds himself at odds with hidden, powerful, and vicious enemies.

Chief Inspector Chen, facing possible disciplinary action, is excluded from a new investigation that has seen a poem said to be criticising the current government removed from the Internet. Left fearing for his career he finds himself reflecting on his life growing up during the Cultural Revolution and his previous cases.

Now a BBC Radio 4 Drama Series.Shanghai in 1990. An ancient city in a country that despite the massacre of Tiananmen Square is still in the tight grip of communist control. Chief Inspector Chen, a poet with a sound instinct for self-preservation, knows the city like few others. When the body of a prominent Communist Party member is found, Chen is told to keep the party authorities informed about every lead. Also, he must keep the young woman's murder out of the papers at all costs. When his investigation leads him to the decadent offspring of high-ranking officials, he finds himself instantly removed from the case and reassigned to another area. Chen has a choice: bend to the party's wishes and sacrifice his morals, or continue his investigation and risk dismissal from his job and from the party. Or worse . . .

Now a BBC Radio 4 Drama Series.Former dancer and party loyalist Wen Liping vanishes in rural China just before she was to leave the country. Her husband, a key witness against a smuggling ring suspected of importing aliens to the US, refuses to testify until she is found and brought to join him in America. A few days later, a badly mutilated body turns up in Shanghai's Bund Park. It bears all the hallmarks of a triad killing. The US immigration agency, convinced that the Chinese government are hiding something, send US Marshal Catherine Rohn to Shanghai to join the investigation. Inspector Chen, an astute young policeman with twin passions for food and poetry, is under political pressure to find answers fast. When Catherine Rohn joins him he must decide what is more dangerous: to hide the truth, or to risk unleashing a scandal that could destroy his career.

Now a BBC Radio 4 Drama Series.Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Bureau is summoned by an official of the Party to lead a highly charged corruption investigation. Tentacles have spread through the police force, the civil service, the vice trade and deep into the criminal underworld. The principal figure and his family have long since fled to the United States, beyond the reach of the Chinese government. But the network is still intact and it is only a matter of time before it becomes stronger than before. Chen is charged -- and it is a job he cannot refuse -- with uncovering those responsible, and destroying the organisation from the top down to its roots. In a twisting case that reunites him with his counterpart from the US Marshals service -- Inspector Catherine Rohn -- Chen must find a measure of justice in a corrupt, expedient world.

Now a BBC Radio 4 Drama Series.Political corruption, capitalist greed and past injustices are all revealed when Inspector Chen investigates a serial killer in Shanghai.An early morning jogger found her. Clad in nothing but a red mandarin dress, she had been dumped, barely concealed, on a traffic island. The death of a dancing girl was unpleasant but this was particularly unusual in that she had been left openly in the centre of town. She had probably angered one of the Mr Big Bucks that were taking over and transforming Shanghai.Inspector Chen is an intuitive investigator, a talented poet and an honourable man on the edge of a nervous breakdown. Desperate to find a way to release himself from the perilous police career that had been chosen for him, he takes time off to begin an MA in Literature. Then another girl is found dead . . . With a serial killer on the loose. Chen is pulled back to work and into his most dangerous assignment yet.

Now a BBC Radio 4 Drama Series.When Inspector Chen Cao agrees to do a translation job for a Triad-connected businessman he is given a laptop, a 'little secretary' to provide for his every need, medical care for his mother. There are, it seems, no strings attached . . . Then a murder is reported: Chen is loath to shorten his working holiday, so Sergeant Yu is forced to take charge of the investigation. The victim, a middle-aged teacher, has been found dead in her tiny room in a converted multi-family house. Only a neighbour could have committed the crime, but there is no motive. It is only when Chen returns and starts to investigate the past that he finds answers. But by then he has troubles of his own.

Now a BBC Radio 4 Drama Series.Tucked away from the building sites of modern Shanghai are the beautiful mansions once owned by the smartest families in 1930s China. They have since been bought by rich businessmen and high-ranking members of the Communist Party. All except one. The owner is an old painter who holds a glittering party each night: swing jazz plays for his former neighbours, who dance, remember old times and forget for an evening the terrors that followed. But questions are being asked. How can he afford such a lifestyle? His paintings? Blackmail? A triad connection? Prostitution? Inspector Chen is asked to investigate discreetly what is going on behind the elegant fa ade. But, before he can get close to anyone, one of the girls is found murdered in the garden and another is terrified she will be next.Chen's quest for answers will take Chen to a strange businessman, triads, Chairman Mao himself and a terrible secret the Party will go to any length to conceal.

Now a BBC Radio 4 Drama Series.'The system has no place for a cop who puts justice above the interests of the Party. It's a miracle that I survived as long as I did.' For years, Chen Cao managed to balance the interests of the Communist Party and the demands made by his job. He was considered a rising star until, after one too many controversial cases that embarrassed powerful men, he found himself neutralised. Under the guise of a promotion, he's been stripped of his title and his influence, discredited and isolated. Soon it becomes clear that his enemies still aren't satisfied, and that someone is attempting to have him killed - quietly. Chen has been charged with the investigation into a 'Red Prince' - a high Party figure who embodies the ruthless ambition, greed and corruption that is on the rise in China. But with no power, few allies, and his own reputation and life on the line, he knows he is facing the most dangerous case of his career.

Chief Inspector Chen Cao never had a choice about his career. A poet by training, he was assigned to the Shanghai Police Department after college. To his own surprise, he became an excellent detective, and now he's in line to take over the top political position in the department. Which is why the Party has chosen him for the investigation into the death of Zhou Keng. Zhou Keng was running the Shanghai Housing Development Committee when a number of his corrupt practices were exposed. Removed from his position and placed into detention, he apparently hanged himself while under guard.The Party is anxious to have Zhou's death declared a suicide, but the sequence of events doesn't quite add up. Now Chen will have to decide what to do - follow the party line, or seek the justice his position requires and risk angering powerful people...

"Dark, gorgeous...feels authentically Chinese and it works like a charm." --Washington Post Book World on A Case of Two CitiesIn Don't Cry, Tai Lake by Qiu Xiaolong, Chief Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Department is offered a bit of luxury by friends and supporters within the Party - a week's vacation at a luxurious resort near Lake Tai, a week where he can relax, and recover, undisturbed by outside demands or disruptions. Unfortunately, the once beautiful Lake Tai, renowned for its clear waters, is now covered by fetid algae, its waters polluted by toxic runoff from local manufacturing plants. Then the director of one of the manufacturing plants responsible for the pollution is murdered and the leader of the local ecological group is the primary suspect of the local police. Now Inspector Chen must tread carefully if he is to uncover the truth behind the brutal murder and find a measure of justice for both the victim and the accused.

Published originally in the pages of Le Monde, this collection of linked short stories by Qiu Xiaolong has already been a major bestseller in France (Cite de la Poussiere Rouge) and Germany (Das Tor zur Roten Gasse), where it and the author was the subject of a major television documentary. The stories in Years of Red Dust trace the changes in modern China over fifty years-from the early days of the Communist revolution in 1949 to the modernization movement of the late nineties-all from the perspective of one small street in Shanghai, Red Dust Lane. From the early optimism at the end of the Chinese Civil War, through the brutality and upheaval of the Cultural Revolution, to the death of Mao, the pro-democracy movement and the riots in Tiananmen Square-history, on both an epic and personal scale, unfolds through the bulletins posted and the lives lived in this one lane, this one corner of Shanghai.