Honolulu Detective Charlie Chan made his literary debut in Earl Derr Biggers' 1925 novel "The House Without a Key." A decade later Chan had become a favorite among B-movie audiences for his quaint aphorisms ("Fingerprints very valuable if detective can catch owner of fingers"), and today, eight decades on, Chinese cops continue to delight mystery enthusiasts.
Out now is Scottish author Peter May's latest work, the sixth title in his Beijing series begun in 1999. May's works combine the standard police procedural and ethnic detective techniques. His two regulars are Li Yan, head of Beijing's serious crime squad, and Margaret Campbell, Li's American lady love, who also happens to be a forensic pathologist and who, at the request of the U.S. Embassy, performs autopsies on Americans who manage to get themselves killed in Beijing. Li and Margaret live together with their infant son but can't wed -- apparently China prohibits its police officials from marrying foreign nationals.
In "Chinese Whispers," Beijing finds itself with a serial murderer determined to emulate the work of 19th-century London's Jack the Ripper. The killer is not merely a copycat in the sense of mutilating victims who happen to be prostitutes; he actually carves them right down to each flayed bit of flesh and missing internal organ -- an effort, we learn, rendered possible by the recent publication of the Chinese translation of a historical work that includes the forensic autopsy reports on Jack's victims.