John Burdett's famed Royal Thai detective Sonchai Jitpleecheep is put to the test both as a Buddhist and as a cop as he confronts the most shocking crime of his career.   A rich American film director has been murdered. It is an intriguing case, and solving it could lead to a promotion for Sonchai, but, as always, he is far more concerned with the state of his karma than he is with his status in the earthly realm. To complicate matters his boss, Colonel Vikorn, has decided to make Sonchai his consigliere in a heroin smuggling operation. Sonchai travels to Kathmandu to meet Vikorn's connection Tietsin, a Tibetan Buddhist monk, and falls under the sway of this dark and charismatic guru. "Burdett's fever-dream mysteries recast the police procedural as psychedelic peep show."-- The New Yorker   "John Burdett is writing the most exciting set of crime novels in the world."-- The Oregonian   " Godfather is written with Burdett's characteristic zest, serving up pungent slices of Bangkok's bazaars and waterways."-- The Boston Globe   "A Thai tale of corruption, mayhem and intrigue."-- San Francisco Chronicle “It is the mordant wit of his exhaustively observant ‘monk manqué’ hero that fuels this blissful and dexterous book.”— Houston Chronicle   “This is a novel brimming with observations and arguments, with absurdity and jokes . . . Witty, learned, and wild.”— The Washington Post Book World   “The spiciest yet of Burdett’s exotic dishes.”— The Times (London)   “Burdett’s latest mystery is delightfully ambiguous, like life itself.”— St. Louis Post-Dispatch   “Block out several hours to read it in one sitting. Once you start, you won’t get anything else done until you finish it.”— Bookpage (Mystery of the Month)   “A dizzying array of multifaceted storylines. . . . Burdett juggles the various plots with great dexterity . . . A whirlwind of a novel.”— Booklist (starred)   “A blissfully nutty caper that brings back fond memories of the late lamented Ross Thomas’s crazy-quilt crime fiction . . . Distinguishing crooks from good guys is only one of the pleasures [here] . . . Sonchai’s wry narrative voice (think: exotic Philip Marlowe) keeps us hooked.”— Kirkus Reviews (starred) John Burdett is the author of A Personal History of Thirst, The Last Six Million Seconds, Bangkok 8, Bangkok Tattoo, and Bangkok Haunts . He divides his time between Thailand and France.   www.john-burdett.com 1 Ours is an age of enforced psychosis. I’ll forgive yours, farang , if you’ll forgive mine—but let’s talk about it later. Right now I’m on the back of a motorbike taxi hurtling toward a to-die-for little murder off Soi 4/4, Sukhumvit. My boss, Colonel Vikorn, called me at home with the good news that he wants me on the case because the victim is said to be some hyper-rich, hyper-famous Hollywood farang and he doesn’t need poor Detective Sukum screwing up with the media. We’ll get to Detective Sukum; for the moment picture me, if you will, a Eurasian Bangkok cop on my way to one of our most popular red-light districts with a Force 8 tropical wind in my face causing eyes to tear and ears to itch, where there awaits an overweight dead Westerner. I’m nearly there. With a little urging my motorbike jockey drives up onto the sidewalk to avoid the massive traffic jam at the Soi 4 junction with Sukhumvit, weaves in between a long line of cooked-food vendors busy feeding the whores from Nana Plaza who have just gotten up (it’s about eleven in the morning), slaloms between a mango seller and a lamppost, returns to the tarmac with the usual jolt to the lower spine, and now we’re slowing to swerve into Subsoi 4. (Should one add the two fours to make the lucky number eight, or should one accept the stark warning: two fours mean death twice within the Cantonese luck system, which has taken over the world as a vital component of globalization?) Finally, here we are with a couple of squad cars and a forensic van in the parking area of the flophouse to welcome yours truly on this fair morning. Also waiting for me is my long-haired assistant, Lek, a katoey — transsexual—who has not yet scraped together the courage or the funds for the final op. He avoids the supernatural brightness in my eyes (I’ve been meditating all night) to inform me, sotto voce, that Detective Sukum is here before me and has already developed possessive feelings toward the cadaver. The good Sukum is half a grade above me, and we are rivals for promotion. Like any jungle carnivore, Sukum is hunched over the kill as if it were all his own work—and who can blame him? Necrophilia is a professional hazard on any murder squad, and I have no doubt my rival is slobbering over his magnificent prize, just as if he had come across the Koh-i-noor diamond in a sewer. Within the value system into which we were all inducted at cadet school, this murder is everyone’s definition of ruang yai: a big one. It will be interesting to see how Sukum handles my inconvenient arrival. I