Overview
Private investigator Lydia Chin has lived in New York City's Chinatown all her life. But even to those born and raised in this city-within-a-city, where the power structure is often based on perceptions and shifting alliances, the complex interactions of Chinatown can be elusive. The Chinese Restaurant Workers' Union - a new, unaligned, and untried union - is making waves in Chinatown by trying to organized the restaurant workers, challenge the powerful restaurant owners, and shift the balance of power. When four restaurant workers, one of them a union organizer, disappear with no known reason and without a trace, the union's lawyer reluctantly hires Lydia Chin to find the missing men. With her sometimes-partner Bill Smith, Lydia soon discovers that she is not the only one looking for them. Approached by all sides and alternately pressured to drop the case and to solve it quickly, Lydia finds herself in the middle of a mysterious conflict between two powerful Chinatown rivals, the New York City police, a struggling union, and a shadowy pair of federal agents. And four missing men, possessing a deadly secret, whose very lives hang in the balance.Synopsis
Joining the company of Sue Grafton, Jonathan Kellerman, and Patricia Cornwell, Shamus Award-winner S.J. Rozan now owns a coveted Anthony Award for Best Novel for her No Colder Place. The Washington Post has called her Bill Smith/Lydia Chin novels...a series to watch for....Booklist deemed Rozan....a major figure in contemporary mystery fiction...Now it's your turn—to discover one of fiction's major voices and to fall in love with a mystery of evocative atmosphere, engaging characters, and exquisite writing.
It's Lydia Chin's turn to go underground as the Chinese-American P.I. investigates a case that strikes at the heart of Chinatown's dangerously shifting power structure. Four restaurant workers, including a union organizer, have disappeared, and the union's lawyer hires Lydia to find them. But when a bomb shatters the Chinese Restaurant Workers' Union headquarters, killing one of the missing men and injuring the lawyer, Lydia is summoned by the prime suspect, one of Chinatown's most powerful men, to continue the search—on his payroll. With backup from her partner Bill Smith, Lydia goes undercover as a dim sum waitress, slinging steamed dumplings while dodging a lethal conflict between the old and the new orders, and searching for the missing waiters and their deadly secret—before someone serves them their last supper
Marilyn Stasio
The rich sights, sounds and textures of daily life in Chinatown are a sumptuous feast for jaded palates. -- New York Times Book Review
Editorials
Marilyn Stasio
The rich sights, sounds and textures of daily life in Chinatown are a sumptuous feast for jaded palates. -- New York Times Book ReviewPublishers Weekly -
While lots of amazing events happen in Rozan's fifth book in her superlative Lydia Chin/Bill Smith series, none surprises more than the moment when Lydia's mother actually admits that she approves of the way her daughter does her job. Mrs. Chin has always hated that her daughter's work as a PI puts her in danger and bad company, namely that of men, like Bill, who don't make suitable husbands. But when Lydia refuses to knuckle under to the demands of a Chinatown patriarch, her mother astonishes her by praising her 'professional manner' -- and then gives her a clue that helps her unravel a mystery involving the smuggling of people and drugs. Since Bill took center stage in the Shamus Award-winning Rozan's last book, No Colder Place), this time it's Lydia's turn in the spotlight. Working undercover as a dim sum waitress at the Dragon Garden, where four illegal aliens have disappeared, Lydia calls upon her deep roots in New York's Chinatown to note and comment on subtle changes in the power structure as new Fukienese-speaking immigrants replace the old Cantonese. She and Bill also move their personal relationship forward a notch and consume vast amounts of wonderful food -- Chinese, Jewish, even a homemade meatloaf -- in a story that manages to satisify all the senses.Kirkus Reviews
Chi-Chun Ho, an organizer for the restaurant workers whom Lydia Chin's old friend Peter Lee is trying to unionize, has disappeared from his apartment, and so have all three of his roommates, two other waiters and a busboy at the Dragon Garden, the Chinatown landmark owned by the powerful (and union-phobic) H.B. Yang. Peter wants Lydia (Mandarin Plaid) to find the men before anything bad happens to them—but even as she takes on the case, it's too late for Ho, who's killed in a bombing of the Chinese Restaurant Workers' Union headquarters that also sends Peter to the hospital. Disturbed because Lydia has been threatened by a roughneck who stopped by her place to warn her off the case, Peter tells her it's time to drop the disappearances into the lap of the law—specifically, into the lap of Peter's girlfriend, NYPD Detective Mary Kee. But no sooner does Peter fire Lydia than she's hired to do the same job by none other than H.B. Yang. Lydia's contortionist attempts to placate each of her clients without giving in to them, her undercover stint as a dim sum waitress at the Dragon Garden, and her sometime romance with her sometime partner Bill Smith (No Colder Place) all keep her balanced precariously on the hyphen in 'Chinese-American,' consistently illuminating both sides of her heritage. Rozan skillfully measures out the layers of double-dealing, keeping her plot just twisty enough to spin it out with consummate professionalism. If you still don't know Lydia and Bill, you'll never have a better chance to meet them.From the Publisher
"Smart, crisp writing...The rich sights, sounds and textures of daily life in Chinatown are a sumptuous feast for jaded palates." —Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times Book Review
"You couldn't ask for better company than Lydia." —Seattle Times/Post-Intelligencer
"A marvelous series...One of the best P.I. duos in contemporary mystery fiction." —Booklist (starred review)
"Superlative...a story that manages to satisfy all the senses." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Engaging, energetic Lydia is good company." —Philadelphia Inquirer
"Rozan skillfully measures out the layers of double-dealing, keeping her plot just twisty enough to spin it out with consummate professionalism. If you still don't know Lydia and Bill, you'll never have a better chance to meet them." —Kirkus (starred review)