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Chinatown Beat (Soho Crime) [Paperback]

Henry Chang (Author)
3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (40 customer reviews)

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Book Description

Soho Crime November 1, 2007
“This is a nasty, terse slice of noir, and Yu is a fellow whose adventures should be worth following.”—The Washington Post Book World

“For readers who relish noir suspense, it doesn't get much better than this stunning novel."—The Boston Globe

“It is an evocative, often bleak, but fascinating view of being at ‘cross-cultural odds’ that fuels Chinatown Beat, the successful debut by New York author Henry Chang.”—South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Chinatown Beat is a classic noir, filled with longing, violence, and that uniquely urban melancholy, but it also brings something new to the table, a loving specificity of a people and place, the multicultures of New York’s Chinatown, that has rarely if ever been encountered in fiction before. A real discovery.”—Richard Price, author of Freedomland and Clockers

“An auspicious beginning.”—Richmond Times-Dispatch

NYPD Detective Jack Yu was raised in Chinatown. Some of his old friends are criminals now; some are dead.

Recently transferred to his old neighborhood, where 99 percent of the cops are white, Jack is confronted with a serial rapist who preys on young Chinese girls. Then Uncle Four, an elderly leader of the charitable Hip Ching Society and member of the Hong Kong-based Red Circle Triad, is gunned down. To solve these crimes, Jack turns to both modern police methods and an ancient fortuneteller.

Henry Chang was born and raised in New York City’s Chinatown, where he now lives. He is a graduate of the Pratt Institute and The City College of New York and is currently a security director in Manhattan.

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

At the start of Chang's promising debut, NYPD detective Jack Yu must cope with his father's recent death and investigate the rape of a grade-school girl on the fringes of Chinatown, where he grew up and has just been stationed. Meanwhile, would-be gangster Johnny Wong is carrying on with Mona, the gorgeous mistress of his employer, Uncle Four, head of the local branch of the Hip Ching tong and a powerful underworld figure in both New York and Hong Kong. As Yu digs deeper into his case, suspecting that an illegal Chinese immigrant may be the serial rapist he is seeking, he finds evidence of a connection between the rapist and the local gangsters. Though Chang builds less suspense than more seasoned police procedural authors, he presents a fascinating look at New York's Chinese-American urban community and its subcultures. (Nov.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

NYPD Detective Jack Yu patrols the area in which he grew up in a falling-apart tenement. His in-the-bone knowledge of his beat is colored by personal concerns: grief and remorse over his father's death and conflicting feelings about preserving his Chinese heritage as an American-born son. Yu is a trustworthy guide to New York's Chinatown, an area in which 99 percent of the beat cops are white and mostly incapable of dealing with the neighborhood's unique form of organized crime, represented by the ancient Chinese secret society, the Hip Chings, and by a clutch of street gangs. Yu's detective efforts here center on tracking down a murderer and a serial rapist who preys upon little girls. Throughout, the enormous difficulties of being a cop in a community that has no faith in the police is emphasized. An intriguing, up-close examination of a closed community. Give this one to fans of S. J. Rozan's Lydia Chin and Bill Smith series, also set in New York's Chinatown. Connie Fletcher
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

  • Paperback: 220 pages
  • Publisher: Soho Crime (November 1, 2007)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1569474788
  • ISBN-13: 978-1569474785
  • Product Dimensions: 5 x 0.6 x 7.5 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (40 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #168,745 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

HENRY CHANG is a native son of Chinatown and a lifetime New Yorker. He writes from the world of the urban Chinese immigrant demimonde, and his work has appeared in Murdaland2, Gangs in New York's Chinatown, The NuyorAsian Anthology, and Bridge Magazine.
His acclaimed 'Chinatown Trilogy' of CHINATOWN BEAT, YEAR OF THE DOG, and RED JADE, is the hard-boiled reflection of lifelong experiences in the Chinese community, and the books have received high praise from the New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, and the Boston Globe, among others.
Henry Chang's website is Chinatowntrilogy.com .
Henry has appeared on 'Asian America' WNYC TV,on Asia Pacific Forum radio WBAI,and has been featured in 'The Voice' NY Times, the 'Book Mark' NYPL, the Downtown Express news, and in the World Journal, Sing Tao, and Ming Pao Chinese news press.
The Author is a graduate of CCNY and the Chinatown School 'of hard knocks'. He has been a Security Director for major hotels and commercial properties in New York City and he continues to reside in Chinatown and post-911 Lower Manhattan.


FROM THE AUTHOR:

"I've been asked about the subjects I write about: Chinatown and Crime.
I'd always wanted to tell these Chinatown stories, true stories of ordinary immigrants struggling to succeed, against the backdrop of organized Chinese crime,-the Triads, the Tongs, and the vicious streetgangs. I also wanted to position the stories within the greater context of what affects Chinese-Americans nationally and internationally.
My protagonist, Chinese-American NYPD Detective Jack Yu, takes the reader on a tour of the Chinatown underbelly while following a police investigation. To me, the stories should not only revolve around the conventional mystery of the 'whodunit' but should also interpret the mystery of why and how things occur in all these Chinatowns across America, and show how crime impacts the survivors and the families involved.
In my books, there will always be tidbits of Chinatown history and sociology dancing in the shadows of the storyline, giving voice back to the voiceless, shedding light on things people don't like to talk about, like exploitation, discrimination, violence and racism in America.
The stories are not simply about cops and criminals, but about how organized crime shadows the immigrant demimonde and controls the underbelly of Chinatown through violence and brutality.
So sit back, and keep your hands in plain sight.
Welcome to Chinatown.

 

Customer Reviews

40 Reviews
5 star:
 (6)
4 star:
 (12)
3 star:
 (12)
2 star:
 (5)
1 star:
 (5)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.2 out of 5 stars (40 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

74 of 78 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Police procedural of Chinese-American NYPD Detective, May 23, 2007
I finished Henry Chang's CHINATOWN BEAT (Soho Press, 2006). The foreign-flavored mysteries Soho Press specializes in publishing appeal to me. Mr. Chang's debut novel is a top-notch entry.
It features NYPD Detective Jack Yu. The locale is in New York's Chinatown area. Written in a gritty, vivid, and detailed prose, Jack runs two concurrent investigations: one for a serial rapist singling out young Chinese girl victims, and the second one for solving the murder of a Chinese elder and community leader named Uncle Four. Jack's personal life is in a bit of shambles as deals with his father's death. The old Chinese ways clash with the 1990 New York City. Jack is a relentless, likeable detective who's not above turning to a Chinese fortune teller for a clue. The chase sequence of the killers leading to the climax (away from NYC) is deftly paced. This crime novel is worth reading if just for the page-after-page of details on Chinese-American culture. The violence is restrained, and the story multi-layered. Recommended.
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31 of 32 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars A solid B, January 5, 2007
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I'll give this a B+ for atmosphere and a B- for plot. The atmosphere is great and you really get a better perspective on the triads and the overseas chinese associations. The storyline I found a little weak and meandering. I'll still buy the next installment though, just to give Henry the benefit of the doubt.
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26 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Edgy debut for Chinese-American cop, December 2, 2006
New York Chinatown native Chang introduces NYPD Detective Jack Yu. Also born and raised in Chinatown, Jack has just buried his immigrant father. Their differences - among them Jack's career - were unresolved, and Jack's grief is tangled up with the conflict between his Chinatown roots and his chosen Americanization.

The plot is a bit confused - involving a serial rapist of schoolgirls and growing turf tension between the established Tongs and the rising street gangs. But the plot takes a backseat to Chang's fascinating evocation of Chinatown culture, dynamics, and tension. Prejudice and racism run rampant through the community and the mostly white officers who police it.

Chang delves deep and fast, requiring a bit of effort from the reader to follow him into hidden byways and unaccustomed thought patterns. This is a promising debut from a knowledgeable, unflinching writer.
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Uncle Four, Hong Kong, New York, Hip Ching, Fuk Ching, Mott Street, San Francisco, Big Uncle, East Broadway, Gee Man, Los Angeles, Ghost Legion, Tofu King, Holiday Inn, Jun Yee, Sunset Park, Brooklyn Bridge, China Plaza, Double Ten, Smith Houses, Tat Louie, Benevolent Association, Canal Street, Confucius Towers, East River
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