Chinatown Beat (Detective Jack Yu) - Hardcover

Chang, Henry

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1569474370 ISBN 13: 9781569474372

Publisher: Soho Crime, 2006

Synopsis

“Here’s a dark slice of New York’s Chinatown that most of us...have probably never seen. Henry Chang takes us on an unforgettable guided tour of its lower depths. In a field awash with pallid noir thrillers, this one is the real thing. A genuine winner.”—Herbert H. Lieberman, author of City of the Dead and Shadow Dancers

“A dramatic evocation of the exotic. . . . More rewarding than a trip to Chinatown.”—Qin Xiaolong, author of Death of a Red Herione

Detective Jack Yu grew up in Chinatown. Some of his friends are criminals now; some are dead. Jack has just been transferred to his old neighborhood, where 99 percent of the cops are white. Unlike the others, confused by the residents who speak another language even when they’re speaking English, Jack knows what’s going on.

He is confronted with a serial rapist who preys on young Chinese girls. Then Uncle Four, an elderly and respected leader of the charitable Hip Ching Society and member of the Hong Kong-based Red Circle Triad, is gunned down. Jack learns that benevolent Uncle Four had a gorgeous young mistress imported from Hong Kong. And she is missing.

To solve these crimes, Jack turns to an elderly fortune teller, an old friend of his, in addition to employing modern police methods. This debut mystery power-fully conveys the sights, sounds, and smells of Chinatown, as well as the attitudes of its inhabitants.

About this title

About the Author

Henry Chang was born and raised in New York City's Chinatown where he now lives. He is a graduate of CCNY and is currently a Security Director. He is the author of CHINATOWN BEAT, the first mystery in the Detective Jack Yu series.

Reviews

At the start of Chang's promising debut, NYPD detective Jack Yu must cope with his father's recent death and investigate the rape of a grade-school girl on the fringes of Chinatown, where he grew up and has just been stationed. Meanwhile, would-be gangster Johnny Wong is carrying on with Mona, the gorgeous mistress of his employer, Uncle Four, head of the local branch of the Hip Ching tong and a powerful underworld figure in both New York and Hong Kong. As Yu digs deeper into his case, suspecting that an illegal Chinese immigrant may be the serial rapist he is seeking, he finds evidence of a connection between the rapist and the local gangsters. Though Chang builds less suspense than more seasoned police procedural authors, he presents a fascinating look at New York's Chinese-American urban community and its subcultures. (Nov.)
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NYPD Detective Jack Yu patrols the area in which he grew up in a falling-apart tenement. His in-the-bone knowledge of his beat is colored by personal concerns: grief and remorse over his father's death and conflicting feelings about preserving his Chinese heritage as an American-born son. Yu is a trustworthy guide to New York's Chinatown, an area in which 99 percent of the beat cops are white and mostly incapable of dealing with the neighborhood's unique form of organized crime, represented by the ancient Chinese secret society, the Hip Chings, and by a clutch of street gangs. Yu's detective efforts here center on tracking down a murderer and a serial rapist who preys upon little girls. Throughout, the enormous difficulties of being a cop in a community that has no faith in the police is emphasized. An intriguing, up-close examination of a closed community. Give this one to fans of S. J. Rozan's Lydia Chin and Bill Smith series, also set in New York's Chinatown. Connie Fletcher
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Edition details

• Publisher: Soho Crime
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1569474370
• ISBN 13: 9781569474372
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 204