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More reviews by Charles Foran
Readers may purchase reviewed books from Paddyfield.com, Asia's online bookseller.North American readers may prefer to buy US editions from Powells.com.
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A Loyal Character Dancer by Qiu Xiaolong
How does a Communist cop catch bad guys? It's an interesting question, one that A LOYAL CHARACTER DANCER takes seriously. This smart second thriller by QIU XIAOLONG, who must be the only Shanghai crime author writing in English and living in St. Louis, Missouri, is more than a cultural curiosity. Qiu knows his hometown well. He also knows his countrymen, especially their battered souls.
Chief Inspector Chen Cao is his man in Shanghai. In an opening borrowed from Martin Cruz Smith's Gorky Park, Chen's morning walk through Bund Park is ruined by the discovery of a mutilated body. His boss, Party Secretary Li, is soon telling him to forget about the corpse and focus instead on an apparent puff assignment -- escorting a US marshal in China to collect a witness for a Stateside trial of snakeheads. "It's in the interest of the Party," Li explains.
Chen may be a smart man, a talented poet as well as a thoughtful officer, but he is in no position to argue. He's a Party climber himself, and has the nice apartment and car-with- driver as proof of his success. When his mentor ups the ante by mentioning nebulous "national interests," the Chief Inspector senses that it won't be only his perks at risk should he fail to balance criminal justice with political expediency.
Sure enough, the witness vanishes and Chen leads a hunt to find her ahead of the Flying-Axes Triad. They hail from Fujian province, where human smuggling is virtually a state- owned enterprise, and their name is no joke. His capitalist ward, Inspector Catherine Rohn, demands a role in the investigation, and the partners tustle over everything from family planning policies to T.S. Eliot -- all to cloak their attraction to one another. Rohn even gets the CIA to do a background check on her guide. Chen, she learns, is an "ambitious Party cadre" with ties to "liberal reformers."
In the Shanghai of A LOYAL CHARACTER DANCER, the cat chasing Deng Xiaoping's proverbial mouse is never black or white -- it is forever grey. Chen Cao shrugs off corrupt colleagues and indirect threats from his own superiors. He also engages some grey-area behavior of his own. He drinks mao tai with a karaoke bar owner and guzzles snake gall served by the beautiful young hostess. The owner can have his parking lot permit, if he gives the Chief Inspector certain information. Chen can probably have the girl, if he wants her.
QIU XIAOLONG, it must be said, is not yet a Martin Cruz Smith. An awkward shoot-out, where axes and bullets fly and only the bad guys get hit, makes for a perfunctory climax. Still, the novel's final pages suggest a serious talent mining a major theme. On the surface, Chen has pulled the assignment off. Both the witness, and his career, have been saved. Neither Party nor national interests have been compromised. "You're a political rising star," Catherine Rohn chides him, "you cannot help yourself."
But nor can this Communist cop help from sacrificing a little more of himself to a system designed to crush the souls of decent people. The title refers to a Cultural Revolution dance where the faithful held up the Chinese character zhong, meaning loyal, to show their devotion to Mao Zedong. A song playing in an airport lounge reminds Chen Cao of a once popular tune, now back in vogue: "We shall be beholden to Chairman Mao, generation after generation." Hearing it, and pondering his own behavior, he wonders: "Was he himself a loyal character dancer in a different time and place?"
Charles Foran
16/12/2002
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Canadian Charles Foran is the author of three novels and three non-fiction works. His most recent work is House on Fire. |
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