Death of a Red Heroine

By: Qiu Xiaolong

Narrated by: David Shih

Length: 16 hrs and 55 mins

Publisher's Summary

Qiu Xiaolong's Anthony Award-winning debut introduces Inspector Chen of the Shanghai Police.

A young "national model worker," renowned for her adherence to the principles of the Communist Party, turns up dead in a Shanghai canal.

As Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Special Cases Bureau struggles to trace the hidden threads of her past, he finds himself challenging the very political forces that have guided his life since birth. Chen must tiptoe around his superiors if he wants to get to the bottom of this crime, and risk his career-perhaps even his life-to see justice done.

©2000 Qiu Xiaolong (P)2017 Tantor

Murder, politics and poetry

Slow start, but as the story unfolds the mementum builds. The Chief Inspector is a likable character, a poet at heart and also very committed to solving the murder case.
I gained a lot of insight on the culture and values in China.

2 people found this helpful

worth it for the history

Narrator David Shih is pretty good, but the storyline is far too slow-moving for the first half. I appreciated the picture of Chinese history, along with the subtleties, and terrors, of party politics. Qiu’s perspective is valuable, and I will read more to see if his plots get better, and clearer.

1 person found this helpful

interesting insight into Chinese an Chines Culture

The book was a nice peek into Chinese culture and how PRC society functions. The ending had a different version of a plot twist; but nevertheless, it illustrated well how the government twist things to continue it's control over the population. The added literary references an added bonus.

1 person found this helpful

it was okay

I started with the first in the series The Mysteries of Inspector Chen which I loved.

The narrator was changed so it took me a little longer to get into this one. it almost didn't "feel" like the same Inspector Chen.


I enjoyed it and will start the third one today.

Very good!

The story keeps your interest until the very end.. But it is also intriguing because of its description of everyday life in the 1990's in Communist China . There is tension between the character's desire to live an honorable life seeking justice and what is "in the best interests of the Party". Also notable in presenting both modern and traditional poetry and descriptions of food.

Ok

This book starts off well and interesting and then tails off and is quite long and boring. You really have to slide through it I found. The near raider was however very good and had distinctive voices free character.

Exhausting

So much for western bourgeois decadence- sex sells
I wouldn’t recommend this book other than a slight glimpse of what is headed down the road for cultural reassignment in the good old us of a

1 person found this helpful