There is no better way to examine a culture or a country than through the eyes of an honest homicide detective investigating a murder that no one but he wants solved. Andy Oakes has created a remarkable character in Chief Investigator Sun Piao, who would be just as at home and competent in New York, London, Paris, or Moscow as he is in Shanghai. Nelson De Mille Sun Piao is released from Ankang, the psychiatric hospital for Chinese dissidents, and demoted to working in the Vice Squad, ostensibly a non-job since the Chinese authorities claim there is no vice in the People's Republic But, before you know it, he is trying to solve a string of murders of prostitutes, murders in which elite army officers are implicated. It is a case no one wants and no one wants solved since it spells danger to all involved. As his fellow PSB Officers are butchered, Sun Piao's investigations lead him to take on the princelings, the sons of the highest cadre in China, as he seeks justice for his colleagues and the murdered women. Finding the evidence that his superiors do not want him to find leads him to become involved in a power struggle between the old and the new guard.
