Murder in Canton

✍ Scribed by Gulik, Robert van

• Book ID: 108794473
• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Year: 2010
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 833 KB
• Series: Judge Dee 13
• Category: Fiction
• ISBN-13: 9780226849058
• ASIN: B004HO5M8A

✦ Synopsis

Brought back into print in the 1990s to wide acclaim, re-designed new editions of Robert van Gulik's Judge Dee Mysteries are now available.

Written by a Dutch diplomat and scholar during the 1950s and 1960s, these lively and historically accurate mysteries have entertained a devoted following for decades. Set during the T'ang dynasty, they feature Judge Dee, a brilliant and cultured Confucian magistrate disdainful of personal luxury and corruption, who cleverly selects allies to help him navigate the royal courts, politics, and ethnic tensions in imperial China. Robert van Gulik modeled Judge Dee on a magistrate of that name who lived in the seventh century, and he drew on stories and literary conventions of Chinese mystery writing dating back to the Sung dynasty to construct his ingenious plots.

Murder in Canton takes place in the year 680, as Judge Dee, recently promoted to lord chief justice, is sent incognito to Canton to investigate the disappearance of a court censor. With the help of his trusted lieutenants Chiao Tai and Tao Gan, and that of a clever blind girl who collects crickets, Dee solves a complex puzzle of political intrigue and murder through the three separate subplots "the vanished censor," "the Smaragdine dancer," and "the Golden Bell."

An expert on the art and erotica as well as the literature, religion, and politics of China, van Gulik also provides charming illustrations to accompany his engaging and entertaining mysteries.

**

From Publishers Weekly

Seventh-century China's Judge Dee is sent to Canton to investigate the disappearance of a court censor; in the plague-ridden Imperial capital, he solves two seemingly unconnected murders that involve the city's most aristocratic families.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From the Back Cover

Murder in Canton takes place in 680 A.D. Judge Dee, recently promoted to Lord Chief Justice, is sent incognito to Canton to investigate the disappearance of a court censor. With the help of his trusted lieutenants Chiao Tai and Tao Gan, and that of a clever blind girl who collects crickets, Dee solves the traditional three puzzles - "The Vanished Censor, The Smaragdine Dancer, and The Golden Bell".