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2000s: The fifth in the China thrillers
2000s: The fifth in the China thrillers
A prodigious Chinese swimmer kills himself on the eve of the Beijing Olympics. Days later, a champion weightlifter suffers a fatal heart attack prior to competition.
Detective Li Yan senses a conspiracy surrounding the fatalities, and finds a female athlete willing to talk. But she will only trust one person: Li’s fiancée, Margaret Campbell.
When Campbell’s contact herself vanishes, the gun is fired on a race against time. And Li must now outrun, and outwit, an enemy bent on pushing him beyond endurance.
This is the city at the height of Olympic fever. The city is on high alert, wanting to protect its image abroad to the extent it is finally sorting out the pollution of the city as best it can. Well, there is not going to be any bad shadows on China’s image when the TV images go live.
The Chinese athletes feel the pressure of performing well and not bringing shame on their country:
“A flutter of fear in the stomach, a rush of adrenaline that accompanies the thought. So much riding on them. The aspirations of a nation. China. More than a billion people investing their hopes in the efforts of the chosen few. An onerous responsibility.”
“The foggy vapour of their breath clearing in their wake like the pollution the authorities have promised to sweep from Bejing’s summer skies before the world finally descends for the Greatest Show on Earth.”
A tragedy, a high level criminal investigation when the world’s eyes are on the city is not going to go down well.
Destination : Bejing, China Author/Guide: Peter May Departure Time: 2000s
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