By any standard, Inspector Chen Cao is a novelty in the world of police procedurals. A published poet and translator of American and English mystery novels, he has been assigned by the Chinese government, under Deng Xiaoping's cadre policy, to a "productive" job with the Special Cases Bureau of the Shanghai Police Department. Shanghai in the mid-1990s is a city caught between reverence for the past and fascination with a tantalizing, market-driven present. When the body of a young "national model worker," revered for her adherence to the principles of the Communist Party, turns up in a canal, Chen is thrown into the midst of these opposing forces. As he struggles to unravel the hidden threads of this paragon's life, he finds himself challenging the very political forces that have guided his life since birth. With party-line-spouting superiors above him and detectives who resent his quick promotion beneath him, Chen finds himself wondering whether justice is a concept at all meaningful in late-20th-century China.
Death of a Red Heroine is a book hovering uneasily between the spheres of fiction and fact, creativity and didacticism. For much of the novel, author Qiu Xiaolong seems more intent on driving home the actions and consequences of the Cultural Revolution and its aftermath than on the slowly unfolding plot. Tedious repetitions of the fates, under Mao, of "educated youths" joust with both the actions of the detectives and Chen's "poetic" ruminations, which, unfortunately, are infected by precisely the stiffness and arbitrariness Qiu is at pains to decry in his historical passages. The moving couplets Chen favors are potentially fascinating insights into the interaction between ancient and modern China, but instead of provoking the reader into reflection, Qiu offers reductive explanations of each and every poem.
The moments when Qiu concentrates on invoking atmosphere are both illuminating and rewarding: Detective Yu's wife's pride and pleasure in having brought home a dozen crabs at "state price" are movingly well crafted, all the more so because Qiu seems almost unaware of what he is doing. Rather than lecturing on the economic dilemmas of the modern worker, he lets Peiqin's simple happiness speak for itself. In the last quarter of the book, Qiu seems to find his stride, though his writing style remains undeniably awkward. Here Chen expands and relaxes, and with him, the novel. Qiu's debut, though anything but polished, holds the promise of better things to come. --Kelly Flynn
From Library Journal
The murder of a young woman found in a canal some distance from Shanghai threatens to go unnoticed and unsolved until someone identifies her as a well-known national model worker. Chief Inspector Chen Cao, a rapidly rising detective with a penchant for Tang and Song dynasty poetry, heads the case, which has become a sudden political event. Chen!s investigation finally wheedles its way past the victim!s false faAade and unloving neighbors to the dangerous perpetrator. In his first novel, the author, who published poetry and criticism in China and who teaches Chinese literature at Washington University in St. Louis, depicts a modern, changeable China, using focused prose, realistic depictions, and a very human protagonist. Recommended.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
The discovery of the body of a beautiful young woman in a canal 20 miles from Shanghai interrupts the housewarming party of Chief Inspector Chen Cao, one of the lucky few to obtain an apartment in the congested city. Cao is a food lover and a poetry lover (he has published a translation of T. S. Eliot, and he is reminded of bits of Chinese poetry even when investigating homicides). Cao is also the head of the Shanghai Police Bureau's Special Cases Squad, Homicide Division. Cao discovers that the victim was a National Model Worker, a role model used for propaganda purposes and recruitment by the Communist Party. The case is politically sensitive, and Cao is urged to do the impossible: solve the case without probing too deeply into the victim's personal life, the details of which may be embarrassing to the Party. The double bind facing the detective is the perfect backdrop for an extended exploration of the conflicts rooted in contemporary China. Xiaolong provides wonderful details of social polarization through his discussions of food, dress, housing. Cao himself is a complex, believable blend of someone devoted both to the flesh and to poetry, a sort of Chinese Maigret. Xiaolong, a Chinese poet and literary critic, is adept at threading social commentary of China in the 1990s with his detective's movements through social strata in search of the killer. Fascinating for what it reveals about China as well as what it reveals about a complex man in this setting. Xiaolong's first mystery may be the most impressive debut of the year. Connie Fletcher
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Review
Praise for Death of a Red Heroine
TIME Magazine's 100 Best Mystery and Thriller Books of All Time
A Parade Magazine 101 Best Mystery Books of All Time
Winner of the Anthony Award for Best First Novel
Nominee for the Edgar Award for Best First Novel
BookRiot 100 Must-Read Novels of Noir
“Another reminder of how the mystery genre can open up countless worlds.”
—Parade Magazine
“A marvelously assured debut . . . Engrossing, immensely readable.”
—The Wall Street Journal
“Xiaolong knows that words can save your soul and in his pungent, poignant mystery, he proves it on every page.”
—Chicago Tribune
“Stupendous . . . [with a] hard-boiled, intricate plot and subtly developed characters . . . A matchless pearl.”
—Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air
“Death Of A Red Heroine grabbed my imagination, took me on a slowly, intricately built journey that nevertheless felt sexy and slick, and kept me turning the pages deep into the night . . . A refreshingly brave exploration into political China, woven around a tense thriller and likeable, enigmatic characters.”
—Huffington Post
“A fascinating and thought-provoking read, rich in descriptions of delicious meals, beautiful gardens and impossibly cramped housing conditions. Not to be missed.”
—The Guardian
“A tale of murder, deception and politics that has the ring of authenticity.”
—St. Louis Post-Dispatch
“An absolutely exquisite book (and I don’t believe I’ve ever before used this descriptor in a review!) . . . Qiu Xiaolong’s attention to culture, politics, loyalty (to persons and to country), poetry, justice (whatever this may be), love, art more generally, law and order and the sacred and intimate relationship between the Chinese people and their food, all blend to form an intellectually stimulating, beautiful, and surprising work of art.”
—Deadly Pleasures Magazine
“Riveting and convincing.”
—Far Eastern Economic Review
“Xiaolong, a Chinese poet and literary critic, is adept at threading social commentary of China in the 1990s with his detective's movements through social strata in search of the killer . . . Xiaolong's first mystery may be the most impressive debut of the year.”
—Booklist
“This political mystery offers a peek into the tightly sealed, often crooked world of post-Tiananmen Square China . . . An impressive and welcome respite from the typical crime novel.”
—Publishers Weekly
“In his first novel, [Xiaolong] depicts a modern, changeable China, using focused prose, realistic depictions, and a very human protagonist.”
—Library Journal
“[Meet] the wonderful and complex Inspector Chen Cao, the ever-impecunious, couplet-quoting poet of the Shanghai Police Bureau. A wonderful, many-faceted gem of a book!”
—William Marshall, The Yellowthread Street Mystery series
“In Death of a Red Heroine China is not only the setting . . . The Party’s attempts to recoup political legitimacy from the real setting for this mystery and cast a dark shadow over every step in its resolution. Raw, naked power is at the core of both the murder and its investigation, but its manifestations are anything but predictable in this splendid first work.”
—Robert E. Hegel, Professor of Chinese and Comparative Literature, Washington University
“A brilliant debut . . . I cannot imagine any readers, including fellow whodunit addicts, who would want to miss this fine novel, which makes a strong bid for a place in lasting literature.”
—Mona Van Duyn, U.S. Poet Laureate, 1992–3
“A sheer delight.”
—I Love a Mystery
“Unique in that it combines the stringency and rigour of police work, the inflexibility of Communism and the need for artistic expression . . . The novel is a fascinating read.”
—Mystery Review
“The main character is three-dimensional and practically jumps off the pages. I am anticipating another case with Inspector Chen.”
—The Snooper
“Much more than a detective story, it is an elegant, true-to-life portrait of China today.”
—Persimmon
About the Author
David Shih is an actor who has done voice-over work and has worked in television, film, and theater. He has appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Unforgettable, and Law & Order, among others. His voice can be heard in video games in the Grand Theft Auto series, on History.com and the History Channel, and as the narrator for several books, including 47 Ronin and The Third Son. He is the winner of an AudioFile Earphones Award.
Qiu Xiaolong is a poet and the author of several novels featuring Inspector Chen, as well as Years of Red Dust, a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2010. Born and raised in Shanghai, Qiu lives with his family in St. Louis, Missouri. 
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