Chief Inspector Chen, knows Shangai like few others. When the body of a prominent Communist Party member is found, Chen is told to keep the party authorities informed about every lead. Chen has a choice: bend to the party's wishes and sacrifice his morals, or continue his investigation and risk dismissal from his job and from the party.
Tucked away from the building sites of modern Shanghai are the beautiful mansions once owned by the smartest families in 1930s China. They have since been bought by rich businessmen and high-ranking members of the Communist Party. All except one. The owner is an old painter who holds a glittering party eachnight: swing jazz plays for his former neighbours, who dance, remember old times and forget for an evening the terrors that followed. But questions are being asked. How can he afford such a lifestyle? His paintings? Blackmail? A triad connection? Prostitution? Inspector Chen is asked to investigate discreetly what is going on behind the elegant façade. But, before he can get close to anyone, one of the girls is found murdered in the garden and another is terrified she will be next. Chen's quest for answers will take Chen to a strange businessman, triads, Chairman Mao himself and a terrible secret the Party will go to any length to conceal.
Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Bureau is summoned by an official of the Party to lead a highly charged corruption investigation. Tentacles have spread through the police force, the civil service, the vice trade and deep into the criminal underworld. The principal figure and his family have long since fled to the United States, beyond the reach of the Chinese government. But the network is still intact and it is only a matter of time before it becomes stronger than before. Chen is charged -- and it is a job he cannot refuse -- with uncovering those responsible, and destroying the organisation from the top down to its roots. In a twisting case that reunites him with his counterpart from the US Marshals service -- Inspector Catherine Rohn -- Chen must find a measure of justice in a corrupt, expedient world.
