Ghost Hero (Lydia Chin and Bill Smith Series #11)

( 6 )

All Available Formats + Editions

——

$12.99

NOOK Book

——

$12.99

Ghost Hero (Lydia Chin and Bill Smith Series #11) (eBook) Pub. Date: 9/27/2011 Publisher: St. Martin's Press
——

$13.98

Paperback

——

$13.98

Ghost Hero (Lydia Chin and Bill Smith Series #11) Pub. Date: 8/21/2012 Publisher: St. Martin's Press
$11.66

$25.05

Hardcover

$11.66

$25.05

Ghost Hero (Lydia Chin and Bill Smith Series #11) Pub. Date: 9/27/2011 Publisher: St. Martin's Press
$19.61

$21.56

Audiobook

$19.61

$21.56

Ghost Hero (Lydia Chin and Bill Smith Series #11) (CD - Unabridged) Pub. Date: 2/14/2012 Publisher: AudioGO

——

$18.21

Ghost Hero: Bill Smith / Lydia Chin Series, Book 11 (MP3 - Unabridged) Pub. Date: 11/23/2011 Publisher: AudioGO

Customers Who Bought This Also Bought

Advertising

Overview

"Rozan again proves that the private detective novel thrives in the 21st century." — Oline Cogdill, The Sun-Sentinel on On the Line

American-Born Chinese PI Lydia Chin is called in on what appears to be a simple case. Jeff Dunbar, art world insider, wants her to track down a rumor. Contemporary Chinese painting is sizzling hot on the art scene and no one is hotter than Chau Chun, known as the Ghost Hero. A talented and celebrated ink painter, Chau's highly-prized work mixes classical forms and modern political commentary. The rumor of new paintings by Chau is shaking up the art world. There’s only one problem – Ghost Hero Chau has been dead for twenty years, killed in the 1989 Tianamen Square uprising.

But not only is Ghost Hero Chau long dead, but Lydia’s client isn't who he claims to be either. And she’s not the only PI hired to look for these paintings. Lydia and her partner, Bill Smith, soon learn that someone else – Jack Lee: PI, art expert, and, like Lydia, American Born Chinese – is also on the case. What starts as rumors over new paintings by a dead artist quickly becomes something far more desperate – a high-stakes crisis the PI's will find themselves risking everything to resolve.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

At the start of Edgar-winner Rozan's excellent 11th novel featuring PI partners Lydia Chin and Bill Smith (after On the Line), Jeff Dunbar, a collector of contemporary Chinese art, hires Lydia to get to the bottom of beguiling rumors that new works by the late Chau Chun (aka Ghost Hero Chau) have somehow surfaced. Chau, who died 20 years earlier during the Tiananmen Square uprising, used traditional symbols and techniques to conceal subversive political messages in brush-and-ink scrolls. The likeliest explanation for the scuttlebutt is that someone has been forging his work. Bill hooks Lydia up with a friend and colleague, Jack Lee, who reveals that he's gotten the identical assignment from a different client, NYU professor Bernard Yang. With doubts growing as to Dunbar's real agenda, Lydia and Bill start fishing to find out what's really going on. Engaging characters, crisp dialogue, intelligent storytelling, and a minimum of violence add up to another winner for Rozan. (Oct.)

Library Journal

Is Lydia and Bill (On the Line) are drawn into the contemporary art world in their 11th outing. What can they make of new paintings from an artist who was killed in Tiananmen Square?

More Reviews (3) Fewer Reviews

Kirkus Reviews

Now that she's been rescued from her kidnappers (On the Line, 2010, etc.), ChinatownPI Lydia Chin deserves a bit of a holiday: a madcap search for some paintings that may or may not be authentic, and may or may not actually exist.

Jeff Dunbar is clear about what he wants: to locate the most recent paintings by Chau Chun, the Ghost Hero late of the Beijing Art Institute. But he's not clear about anything else. He doesn't give Lydia his real name. He doesn't tell her why he needs to hire a private eye, and one with no expertise tracking down artworks, to find the paintings instead of waiting for them to come on the market. He can't explain why Chau would have any new work available when he was killed in Tiananmen Square 20 years ago. He doesn't warn Lydia that he's not the only person looking for the paintings. So she and her partner Bill Smith are dumbfounded when Jack Lee, the specialist friend of Bill's they consult, tells them that he's working the same case too. Once Jack reveals the identity of his client—Bernard Yang, the NYU professor who held the Ghost Hero's hand as he died—the game is afoot, and what a game it is, with no bloodletting and not much suspense but more cons and double-crosses thanThe Sting.Before the case is finally laid to rest, Bill will disguise himself as wealthy, mobbed-up art patron Vladimir Oblomov and Jack as art authenticator Dr. Lin Qiao-xiang to fool greedy gallery owner Doug Haig, with new revelations of other players' deceptions arriving every ten minutes.

Pleasantly foolish, insubstantial and harmless, though Bill's extended turn as Oblomov is a little hard to take. Are the lowlife creeps who chase high art really that gullible?

Marilyn Stasio

Every S. J. Rozan mystery featuring sleuthing partners Lydia Chin and Bill Smith comes with a bonus feature that makes New York feel vital and fabulous. In Ghost Hero, it's an inside look at the city's art scene, from imposing uptown galleries and trendy storefront spaces in Chelsea to starving-artists' warehouse collectives in Queens.
—The New York Times Book Review

Maureen Corrigan

S.J. Rozan is a good old-fashioned mystery writer, and I mean that as a high compliment…Ghost Hero is haunted by the tragedies and courageous legacy of China's failed democracy movement. As Lydia and Bill get caught up in the swirl of rumors about Chau's paintings, Rozan raises philosophical issues about the power of art to agitate and inspire, and about the morality of secluding that art on the walls of wealthy collectors.
—The Washington Post

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780312544508
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Publication date: 9/27/2011
Pages: 336
Sales rank: 65,888
Series: Lydia Chin and Bill Smith Series, #11
Product dimensions: 9.26 (w) x 6.26 (h) x 1.11 (d)

Meet the Author

S. J. Rozan is the author of the acclaimed novel Absent Friends in addition to eight other novels in the Egdar, Shamus, Nero, Macavity, and Anthony award–winning Lydia Chin/Bill Smith series. This includes Winter and Night, which won the Edgar, Nero, and Macavity Awards for Best Novel, and was nominated for the Shamus, Anthony, and Barry Awards. Born and raised in the Bronx, Rozan is an architect in a New York firm and lives in Greenwich Village.

Customer Reviews

Average Rating 4.5

( 6 )

Rating Distribution

( 3 )
( 3 )
( 0 )
( 0 )
( 0 )

If you've bought this product, tell the world how you liked it.

Write a Review

KenCady

Posted December 4, 2011

more from this reviewer

A Ghost As Hero?

A ghost as hero? Well, why not? So much fiction requires us to suspend belief, in Ghost Hero author S.J. Rozan makes it a pleasure. The story is mostly told in conversation between very likable characters. To tell a story in that manner is hard to pull off without making the conversations stilted. But here they are pleasantly breezy, but so well-crafted that I was impressed the more I read. When all was done, I felt eager to read other stories in the series, which was all new to me. Author Rozan took some big chances with her invented characters such as Vladimir and Dr. Lin, but they worked well and with great humor. And the um, real characters did too. I particularly liked Jack and Eddie To.
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.
MarjorieofConnecticut

Posted September 17, 2011

A Great New Caper Set in the NYC Art World with Investigators Lydia Chin and Bill Smith

There are few authors that can keep a series fresh and entertaining in the way that S.J. Rozan has with her Lydia Chin/Bill Smith PI books. In her 11th, GHOST HERO, she brings her two private investigators into the world of art (Chinese and Chinese-American) in the galleries of New York City where they cross paths with another PI. I won't say any more because I know that part of the joy of reading a book is discovering what comes next. I will say that Rozan's humor, her intricate plots (that feel like a literary peeling away of the layers on an onion), her keen observations about human nature and her street smarts make this another wonderful addition to the series. I prefer to read most series in the order that they were written, but if you haven't read any of this series before (and why haven't you?), this would be an excellent place to start. But I think that you'll then go back to CHINA TRADE (the 1st in the series) and start all over again. Enjoy!
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.
harstan

Posted September 11, 2011

more from this reviewer

This is a super twisting Chin and Smith investigative thriller

Modern day Chinese art collector Jeff Dunbar hears rumors of the discovery of previously unknown works by the late "Ghost Hero" Chau Chun, who died during the Tiananmen Square uprising. A legend among freedom lovers, the Ghost Hero concealed anti-government messages in his drawings. Although Jeff assumes that if the paintings exist they are forgeries as they contain contemporary political messages or the Ghost lives, he hires Chinese-American private investigator Lydia Chin to look into the existence and authenticity of the claims.

Lydia's partner Bill Smith introduces her to a sleuthing colleague Jack Lee, also a native Chinese-American. Jack explains that NYU professor Bernard Yang has hired him to investigate the Chau Chun claims. As the detectives compare notes, Lydia and Bill wonder what their client really wants.

This is a super twisting Chin and Smith investigative thriller (see On the Line) that grips readers from the moment Dunbar hires Chin and never slows down until the final denouement. The key cast is fully developed in this fast-paced yet cerebral mystery. Like Chin, Smith and Lee, readers will want to know who is painting the current Ghost Hero masterpieces.

Harriet Klausner
Was this review helpful? Yes NoThank you for your feedback. Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.
Anonymous

Posted October 9, 2011

No text was provided for this review.
Anonymous

Posted November 8, 2011

No text was provided for this review.
Anonymous

Posted October 11, 2011

No text was provided for this review.

If you find inappropriate content, please report it to Barnes & Noble