Death Avenue
Manhattan in 1919 is an unsettled and treacherous place for Chinese people. With the ramifications of the Chinese Exclusion Act still in effect, Chinese men in particular are viewed as suspicious foreigners who are routinely targeted as probable immigration violators. Prohibition looms as well, as does the lure of making fast money from illegal gambling.
In this place where danger and opportunity exist side by side, we meet Eddie, a Chinese American man who can pass for white, and who has recently returned from the battlefields of WWI. Eddie now has a job retrieving dead bodies for the city morgue from the streetcar tracks at night so that commerce can continue unimpeded. When he finds the body of a Chinese man carrying an unusual notebook, Eddie sets out to discover who he was and if he has relatives who can bury him. As Eddie attempts to trace the identity of this man, however, he crosses paths with a series of powerful and menacing people trying to find this notebook in order to make a lot of money from its contents. Protecting its contents leads Eddie and his friends into perilous situations where money, power, and reputation intersect in the dark alleys of New York both inside and outside of Chinatown.
As a fast-paced, action-packed novel, this story will appeal to fans of murder mysteries and urban crime set at the dawn of Prohibition. Its New York setting, the mood it evokes, and the authentically realistic language used by its characters all combine to give the novel a truly unique feel. Deeper themes of cultural identity, personal conscience, and assimilation into American culture on the part of Chinese immigrants may further appeal to readers of this entertaining and informative book.
