Bangkok 8 by John Burdett

A thriller with attitude to spare, Bangkok 8 is a sexy, razor-edged, often darkly hilarious novel set in one of the world's most exotic cities. Witnessed by a throng of gaping spectators, a charismatic Marine sergeant is murdered under a Bangkok bridge inside a bolted-shut Mercedes Benz. Among the witnesses are the only two cops in the city not on the take, but within moments one is murdered and his partner, Sonchai Jitpleecheep-a devout Buddhist and the son of a Thai bar girl and a long-gone Vietnam War G.I.-is hell-bent on wreaking revenge. On a vigilante mission to capture his partner's murderer, Sonchai is begrudgingly paired with a beautiful FBI agent named Jones and captures her heart in the process. In a city fueled by illicit drugs and infinite corruption, prostitution and priceless art, Sonchai's quest for vengeance takes him into a world much more sinister than he could have ever imagined. Editorial Reviews A tour de force. . . . Burdett is purely and simply a wonderful writer. -The Washington Post A stiletto-sharp mystery/thriller . . . brilliantly rendered. -The Seattle Times-Post Intelligencer Like Thai cuisine, Burdett's comic thriller blends spicy, sour, salty and sweet-and makes for a delicious wake-up for jaded palates. -People Vividly written and even more vividly imagined. . . . This novel is as wild as the city in which it takes place. . . . Read it to blow your mind. -Milwaukee Journal Sentinel A thriller as exotic as it is enthralling, and as provocative as it is obscene. -Harper's One of the year's most seductive thrillers. . . . Think of Bangkok 8 as a destination spot for any reader with a taste for the exotic and desire for a really good time. -New York Daily News Gruesome and memorable. -The New York Times Burdett knows how to dole out engagingly gory details and hard-boiled platter. -Entertainment Weekly A different kind of mystery, one you're not likely to have seen before. . . . Bangkok 8 makes you change your perspective. It takes you into another world and exposes you to different ways of thinking. -Rocky Mountain News Bangkok 8 is one of the most startling and provocative mysteries that I've read in years. The characters are marvelously unique, the setting is intoxicating and the plot unwinds in dark illusory strands, reminiscent of Gorky Park. Once I started, I didn't want to put it down. -Carl Hiaasen Edgy, intricate and atmospheric . . . [Burdett] uses plenty of narrative sleight-of-hand to weave together character development, comic relief and inspired plot twists while steering clear of facile exoticism. -Time Out, New York The wildest ride in modern crime novel exoticum. A novel so steeped in milieu that it feels as if you've blasted to mars in the grip of a demon who won't let you go. Read this book, savor the language-it's the last-and the most compelling word in thrillers. -James Ellroy Characters are well-developed and the tale is carefully woven and fun to read. -Columbus Dispatch - From the Publisher The Barnes & Noble Review This street-smart thriller set in the mean streets of Bangkok features Detective Sonchai Jitpleecheep, son of a former Thai bar girl and a long-gone American G.I. An aspiring Buddhist monk with a druggie past he doesn't disavow, Jitpleecheep loves examining human nature and metaphysics, but he is truly enlightened when it comes to the internationally notorious, seamy, and seedy sides of Bangkok. Author John Burdett opens the proceedings in spectacular fashion with the stunningly horrific murder of an American marine. When Jitpleecheep's partner and soul brother is killed -- by a doped cobra -- minutes into the investigation, the mellow detective's mission to solve the crime becomes both personal and spiritual. He vows to avenge his partner's death by killing the people responsible. Populated with Thai prostitutes, European and American sex tourists, the FBI, drug dealers both large and small, and more crooked cops than a Jerry Bruckheimer movie, Bangkok 8 is as addictive as speed and as thrilling as sex. You'll be hooked until the bitter, explosive end. Andrew Ayala - bn.com ... part Blade Runner and part Raymond Chandler's Los Angeles ... - Michiku Kakutani - The New York Times What Burdett, a former lawyer who now lives in Hong Kong, is doing is seducing his readers into thinking not as logical Westerners devoted to the basic rule of cause and effect but as Thai Buddhists who accept and even celebrate life's illogical turns. - David Willis McCullough - NY Times Sunday Book Review Bangkok 8 meets the thriller genre's requirements -- it's set in an exotic locale; its dramatis personae are in various measures violent, beautiful and mysterious; its plot is labyrinthine and surprising; its ending is ambiguous and ironic -- except one: It is not what reviewers insist on calling a page-turner. Quite to the contrary. You make your way slowly, painstakingly through Bangkok 8, because you don't want to miss a thing -- not because of the plot's twists and turns, though you do have to pay attention, but because John Burdett is purely and simply a wonderful writer, a genuine grown-up at work in a genre mostly populated by arrested adolescents. - Jonathan Yardley - The Washington Post Set in Thailand's capital in the mid-1990s, this ambitious first novel by Burdett (The Last Six Million Seconds) follows the city's only honest police detective, Sonchai Jitplecheep, as he searches for the person responsible for the deaths of his partner (a friend from childhood) and an American Marine sergeant. This thriller abounds with sensational elements-from homicidal vipers on speed to jade smuggling and the Thai sex trade-but listeners would be wise to follow the lead of Buddhist narrator Sonchai, who is more interested in the graceful acceptance of life's puzzles than in their resolution. The policeman's account of his harsh life and what he must do to serve both the Buddha and his teeming, decadent city enriches the novel, but those fond of neatly wrapped tales may find the surreal but shocking finale less than satisfying. The inspired casting of Wong, who's known for his roles in Madame Butterfly and Oz, more than makes up for this small flaw, however. Wong skillfully conveys the secret pain and self-doubt lurking beneath Sonchai's insouciant facade, while underlining the Eastern mood and the dark humor of Burdett's unique noir tale. (June) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information. - Publishers Weekly Pichai and Sonchai, Buddhist penitents and incorruptible anomalies among Thai police, are tailing an African American marine when they find him murdered in his Mercedes, killed by a mass of cobras and a giant python. When Pichai himself succumbs to a fatal bite, Amerasian detective Sonchai Jitplecheep sets out to avenge his death. Paired with a blonde FBI agent who provides sexual tension and acts as a Western foil for Sonchai's disarming mysticism, he follows strands of forensic and karmic evidence leading to a beguiling dark beauty, a high-powered jade dealer, Chinese businessmen, and Khmer Rouge thugs. In his second East-meets-West thriller (after The Last Six Million Seconds), Burdett evokes an intriguing and exotic Bangkok where hungry ghosts and capitalists throng the busy intersection of the eightfold path and the red-light district. The depiction of the occasional kinkiness and sadism of this world never seems gratuitous and is skillfully refracted through a highly original sleuth. The pace never flags, every page unfolding fresh mysteries of the psychological, cultural, metaphysical, and locked-room varieties. Highly recommended for all public libraries. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 2/1/03.]-David Wright, Seattle P.L. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information. - Library Journal East and West coexist in a murderous symbiosis in this exotic thriller by British author (and Hong Kong resident) Burdett (The Last Six Million Seconds, 1997, etc.). This tangled tale of drugs, sex, and political corruption is narrated by Krung Tep (i.e., Bangkok) detective Sonchai Jitpleecheep, a half-caste Third World cop who speaks English and French, has a criminal past, and still does the local drug of choice (yaa baa). Burdett kickstarts the tale with a dynamite opening sequence: the discovery of black US Marine William Bradley's dead body in his Mercedes, filled with seemingly drug-crazed cobras and a giant python wrapped amorously around the torso of the deceased. Sonchai's investigation, done in tandem with American authorities, and abetted and complicated by gorgeous FBI agent Kimberley Jones, takes us through the meanest and seamiest streets of District 8 (Sonchai's turf), and introduces us to a beguiling gallery of sinister personages portrayed with black-comic brio. The principals include a beautiful black woman whose relationship to Bradley isn't initially clear; Sonchai's pragmatic mother Nong, a retired bar girl interested in the commercial potential of Viagra; his crafty boss Colonel Vikorn, who's a little too cozy with CIA ops in Thailand and abroad; jade mogul (and connoisseur of Bangkok's thriving sex industry) Sylvester Warren; and a fast-talking transsexual with a sure survival instinct. A Russian nuclear physicist turned pimp, Barbara Hutton's jadeite wedding necklace, and an educational visit to a crocodile farm keep the reader alert--even when Sonchai's summary descriptions of Bangkok's history, culture, and economic priorities lapse into exposition andbackground information clumsily grafted onto the story. Burdett is more successful with Sonchai's frequent citations of Buddhist wisdom: they're funny, endearing (and informative) building blocks in the creation of an unusual and interesting protagonist. Enjoyable, mostly, with a savage payoff and a smoky, acidic aftertaste. First printing of 100,000 - Kirkus Reviews Sonchai, the only honest cop in Bangkok, vows to avenge the murder of his partner and soul mate. From that resolve our hero, a devout Buddhist and son of a prostitute, delves into the seamy streets of Thailand's decadent, exotic capital. He partners with a female FBI agent, and the two develop a mutual sexual attraction-repulsion. Tough-cop noir clichs abound, cleverly and arrestingly Asianized by the author, a Brit who has lived in Bangkok and knows it intimately. BD Wong made a sensation in his Broadway debut in M. BUTTERFLY. In this excellent abridgment, he demonstrates his expertise with characters, accents, and narrative twists. Yet, somehow he fails to deliver the text's thick atmosphere and sense of danger. Y.R. 2004 Audie Award Finalist AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine - DEC 03/JAN 04 - AudioFile