Death of a Red Heroine: An Inspector Chen Investigation

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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.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Contemporary Shanghai comes vividly to life in this new mystery series.

Inspector Chen of the Shanghai Police must find the murderer of a National Model Worker, and then risk his own life and career to see that justice is done.

Qiu Xiaolong has published prizewinning poetry and criticism in China, has won awards and fellowships in the United States, and now teaches Chinese literature at Washington University in St. Louis.

"Stupendous . . . hard-boiled, intricate plot and subtly developed characters . . . vivid picture of China in the 1990s . . . A matchless pearl." (Maureen Corrigan, "Fresh Air," National Public Radio)

"A marvelously assured debut . . . Engrossing, immensely readable." (The Wall Street Journal)

"Chen is an irresistible protagonist, likable and determined to make the honorable choice, no matter how dangerous." (Kirkus Reviews, pointer review)

". . . Xiaolong knows that words can save your soul and in his pungent, poignant mystery, he proves it on every page." (Chicago Tribune)

FROM THE CRITICS

Carolyne A. Van Der Meer - Mystery Review

There is nothing more arresting than seeing, for the first time, something you are normally not allowed to see. And that is precisely what Qiu Xialong's first mystery, Death of a Red Heroinedoes. The novel is a fascinating read because it sheds light on a lifestyle that is virtually unknown to western society.

Publishers Weekly

Set a decade ago in Shanghai, this political mystery offers a peek into the tightly sealed, often crooked world of post-Tiananmen Square China. Chen Cao, a poet and T.S. Eliot translator bureaucratically assigned to be chief inspector, has to investigate the murder of Guan Hongying, a young woman celebrated as a National Model Worker, but who kept her personal life strictly and mysteriously confidential. Chen and his comrade, Detective Yu, take turns interviewing Guan's neighbors and co-workers, but it seems most of them either know nothing or are afraid to talk openly about a deceased, highly regarded public figure. Maybe they shouldn't be so uneasy, some characters reason; after all, these are "modern times" and socialist China is taking great leaps toward free speech. Chen and Yu make headway when they stumble on Wu Xiaoming, senior editor of Red Star magazine, who apparently was involved with Guan before her death. Tiptoeing around touchy politics and using investigative tactics bordering on blackmail, Chen slowly pieces together the motives behind the crime. The author, himself a poet and critic, peppers the story with allusions to classical Chinese literature, juxtaposing poignant poetry with a gruesome murder so that the novel reads like the translation of an ancient text imposed over a modern tale of intrigue. This is an impressive and welcome respite from the typical crime novel. (June) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.|

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 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

An engrossing first novel set in China during the 1990s that begins as a simple police procedural and then just keeps on getting more complex. A published poet and translator of T.S. Eliot, Chen Cao is not your ordinary chief inspector of homicide, and departmental gossip has it that powerful people have been unduly friendly to his career. Not that anyone thinks Chen is unfit for the job—he has brains, nerve, and an unshakable belief that criminals are bad for China—but the fact is, he's in his early 30s, unsuitably young, some say, to be in charge of the Shanghai Police Bureau's Special Case Squad. The whispering climbs a decibel level when Chen gets that most enviable of establishment perks, his own apartment. Thus, on the day a high-profile murder case comes within reach, Chen is all over it, intent on cracking it in order to validate his worth to colleagues, superiors, and, most importantly, to himself. Guan Hongying, the victim, was a National Model Worker, that is to say, a poster girl for impeccable behavior and devotion to the socialist ideal. Soon enough, however, it becomes clear that there were other sides to Guan, that her famous probity was a sometime thing at best, that she was ambitious, even ruthless. Methodically, step by careful step, Chen and his staff assemble the case against the one person who had the means, the opportunity, and the need to do away with Guan. But that person, Chen discovers, just might be above the law. The writing, particularly the dialogue, is a shade awkward at times, but Chen is an irresistible protagonist, likable and determined to make the honorable choices, no matter how dangerous. Qiu's portrait of China in transition, apotentialeye-opener for many of his Western readers, is an equally compelling attraction.