The Lord of Death

Starred review from April 20, 2009
Edgar-winner Pattison blends an eye-opening look at contemporary China with a traditional whodunit in his stellar sixth Tibet mystery (after 2007's Prayer of the Dragon
). Shan Tao Yun, exiled after a career pursuing high-level corruption in the Chinese government, is arrested for the murder of China's minister of tourism, gunned down along with an American woman, Megan Ross, near Mount Everest at about the time an avalanche crushed a military bus transporting political prisoners. Though Shan persuades the arresting officer to release him from custody, he's replaced in the dock by Colonel Tan, Shan's only hope of rescuing his imprisoned son, Shan Ko. If he's to see Shan Ko again, Shan must clear the colonel by finding the real killer. The official consensus that Ross, a veteran climber, is still alive complicates Shan's efforts. Newcomers as well as those already emotionally invested in the resourceful and ethical sleuth will cheer him on. Author tour.

June 1, 2009
Step by perilous step, Inspector Shan gets tangled in another complex and sensitive investigation.

Exiled Beijing Investigator Shan Tao Yun treks slowly along forbidding Mount Everest, fulfilling his promise to female diviner Ama Apte to transport a corpse. Comically officious Constable Jin, a native Tibetan now fervently Chinese, attempts to arrest Shan, who's spent time in a Tibetan slave-labor camp for murder, until Shan shows him how long the corpse has been a corpse. The complex tensions since the Chinese have taken over Tibet continue to play out when, after his encounter with Jin, Shan spies the aftermath of a bus accident on a road below: A score of Tibetan monks on their way to detention camps are suddenly free. Nearby, Shan finds a blond woman dying of a gunshot wound who whispers her last words to him in English:"The raven." Her apparent companion was a Chinese woman, already dead. Native curiosity prompts the veteran detective to unravel this mystery, and more urgent reasons raise the stakes: his reputation, recompense for the aborted mission and, most important, leverage with the Chinese officials who have recently imprisoned Shan's son, Shan Ko. Beginning with local Party member and VIP Tsipon and wise Ama Apte, he makes his appeal.

A whodunit wrapped in a socio-political thriller, all the more valuable for its timeliness. Shan's sixth case (Prayer of the Dragon, 2007, etc.) is aimed at readers who savor subtlety and complexity.

(COPYRIGHT (2009) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

June 1, 2009
Adult/High School-In Tibet, Shan, an exiled Chinese national, undertakes the difficult task of transporting a corpse over the slopes of Mount Chomolungma (Everest). For religious and spiritual reasons, the successful delivery of the body is crucial to the inhabitants of a local village. Shan knows that he must complete the mission if he is to have any hope of seeing his son released from the deadly confines of a nearby Chinese "yeti factory." Things go terribly wrong. While on the mountain trail with the corpse atop a mule, Shan is suddenly at the scene of a double murder as one of the victims utters her last mystifying words. Also, in short order he encounters an explosion, a landslide, and boulders blocking a bus carrying red-robed monks being held captive by the Chinese authorities. With Shan's aid, several monks disperse. Shots are fired, Shan is arrested for the murders, and the mule and corpse are gone. How the resourceful protagonist negotiates the minefield of villains and thugs, avoids death, and tracks down the truth will keep readers engrossed. But as good as the twists and turns of this thrilling page-turner may be, and as thoroughly as the main characters are portrayed, it's the superbly rendered background story of a nation under siege that sets the book apart. Teens will be struck by how completely and systematically the Chinese government has tried to crush the Tibetan people. And they will be amazed as well by how much strength the Tibetans have found within themselves, and in their deep and complex faith."Robert Saunderson, formerly at Berkeley Public Library, CA"

Copyright 2009 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from May 1, 2009
Readers seeking a change from urban whodunits have embraced Edgar Awardwinner Pattisons superlative series set in ethereal, enigmatic, long-enduring Tibet. Shan Tao Yun, disgraced Beijing investigator and survivor of a Tibetan gulag, now spends his days quietly dwelling among residents of the Roof of the World. Over the years, his intimate knowledge of the inner workings of the Chinese political system has proved invaluable in solving a host of compelling conundrums. In this sixth installment (after Prayer of the Dragon, 2007), Shan is transporting a corpse over the slopes of Mt. Everest when he hears gunfire. Two womena Chinese minister and an outspoken American hikerhave been shot and left for dead at the side of the road. The Chinese authorities are quick to blame the inhabitants of a local village, who have long harbored animosity toward a government that sees Tibets majestic mountains as little more than a tourist commodity. Shan questions revered soothsayers and surly colonels in search of answers, ever aware that the survival of his son Kocurrently imprisoned in a Chinese asylumdepends on his success. Pattison serves as literary ambassador to beautiful, brutal Tibet in a tale that engages, enlightens, and entertains.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)