Eliot Pattison

WEDNESDAY JUNE 3, 7pm – Crime Fiction
ELIOT PATTISON

author of The Lord of Death ($24.00 Soho)

Shan Tao Yun is an exiled Chinese national and a former Beijing investigator on parole from the Tibetan gulag to which he had been consigned as punishment. He is ferrying a corpse on muleback over the slopes of Chomolungma—Everest—at the request of a local wisewoman who says the gods have appointed this task to him, when he encounters what looks like a traffic accident. A government bus filled with imprisoned illegal monks has overturned. Then Shan hears gunfire. Two women in an approaching sedan have been killed. One is the Chinese minister of tourism; the other, a blond Westerner, organizes climbing expeditions. Though she dies in his arms, Shan is later met with denials that this foreigner is dead.

Shan must find the murderer, for his recompense will be the life and sanity of his son, Ko, imprisoned in a Chinese “yeti factory” where men are routinely driven mad.

Praise for the Tao Yun Shan series:

“Majestic.” — The New York Times Book Review

“A powerful picture of courage in the face of tyranny.” — The Washington Post

“Nothing I’ve read or seen about how China has systematically crushed the soul of Tibet has been as effective.” — Chicago Tribune

Eliot Pattison is an international lawyer based near Philadelphia. His five previous Shan novels, set in Tibet, The Skull Mantra (St Martins 1999), Water Touching Stone (2001), Bone Mountain (2002), Beautiful Ghosts (2004), and Prayer of the Dragon (2007), have been critical and commercial successes. He won the Edgar for Best First Novel and was nominated for the CWA Golden Dagger.