Qiu Xiaolong

Author Information
Qiu Xiaolong's Latest Book

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  • Bibliography:
    16 Books (2 Series)
  • First Book:
    June 2000
  • Latest Book:
    November 2024
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Full Series List in Order

An Inspector Chen Novel

1 - Death of a Red Heroine (Jun-2000)
2 - A Loyal Character Dancer (Oct-2002)
3 - When Red is Black (Jul-2004)
4 - A Case of Two Cities (Oct-2006)
5 - Red Mandarin Dress (Dec-2007)
6 - The Mao Case (Mar-2009)
7 - Don't Cry, Tai Lake (May-2012)
8 - The Enigma of China (Jun-2013)
9 - Shanghai Redemption (Sep-2015)
10 - Hold Your Breath, China (Jun-2020)
11 - Becoming Inspector Chen (Mar-2021)
12 - Inspector Chen and the Private Kitchen Murder (Oct-2021)
13 - Love and Murder in the Time of Covid (Jul-2023)

A Judge Dee Investigation

1 - The Shadow of the Empire (Jan-2022)
2 - The Conspiracies of the Empire (Nov-2024)

Book List in Order: 16 titles

  • Death of a Red Heroine

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 1

    A young "national model worker," renowned for her adherence to the principles of the Communist Party, turns up dead in a Shanghai canal. As Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Special Cases Bureau struggles to trace the hidden threads of her past, he ...

  • A Loyal Character Dancer

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 2

    The second book in the Inspector Chen investigationsInspector Chen’s mentor in the Shanghai Police Bureau has assigned him to escort US Marshal Catherine Rohn. Her mission is to bring Wen, the wife of a witness in an important criminal trial, to th...

  • When Red is Black

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 3

    When the murder of a woman is reported to the Shanghai police while Inspector Chen is on vacation, Sergeant Yu is forced to take charge of the investigation. The victim, Yin Lige, a novelist known for her banned book, has been found dead in her tiny,...

  • A Case of Two Cities

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 4

    Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Bureau is summoned by an official of the party to take the lead in a corruption investigation - one where the principle figure and his family have long since fled to the United States and beyond the reach of ...

  • Red Mandarin Dress

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 5

    A serial killer is stalking the young women of Shanghai. The killer’s calling card is to leave the victims’ bodies in well trafficked locations, each of them redressed in a red mandarin dress. With the newspapers screaming about Shanghai’s firs...

  • The Mao Case

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 6

    Chief Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Department is the head of the Special Case group and is often put in charge of those cases that are considered politically "sensitive" since, as a rising party cadre, he's regarded by many as reliable. ...

  • Years of Red Dust

    Published originally in the pages of Le Monde, this collection of linked short stories by Qiu Xiaolong has already been a major bestseller in France (Cite de la Poussiere Rouge) and Germany (Das Tor zur Roten Gasse), where it and the author was the s...

  • Don't Cry, Tai Lake

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 7

    Chief Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Department is offered a bit of luxury by friends and supporters within the Party -- a week's vacation at a luxurious resort near Lake Tai, a week where he can relax, and recover, undisturbed by outsid...

  • The Enigma of China

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 8

    Chief Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Department is in an unusual situation -- a poet by training and inclination, he was assigned by the party to the Police Department after he graduated college, where he has continued to shine. Now he’...



  • Shanghai Redemption

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 9

    "The system has no place for a cop who puts justice above the interests of the Party. It's a miracle that I survived as long as I did." For years, Chen Cao managed to balance the interests of the Communist Party and the promises made by his job. H...

  • Hold Your Breath, China

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 10

    Inspector Chen is on the case of a serial murderer when he is called away to report on environmentalists trying to tackle the pollution issues in China. Chief Inspector Chen and Detective Yu Guangming are brought into a serial murder case when the...

  • Becoming Inspector Chen

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 11

    Inspector Chen is excluded from a poetry case as he awaits possible disciplinary action, leaving him to reflect on his career . . . but does his past hold a clue to the poetry case? After a number of grueling cases Chief Inspector Chen is facing m...

  • Inspector Chen and the Private Kitchen Murder

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 12

    Chen Cao has been removed from his chief inspector role, but that doesn’t stop him investigating a ‘private kitchen’ murder that has similarities to a Judge Dee story. No longer a chief inspector, Chen Cao finds himself as director of the Shan...

  • The Shadow of the Empire

    A Judge Dee Investigation - 1

    'Brilliant' â€"Publishers Weekly Starred ReviewThe legendary Judge Dee Renjie investigates a high-profile murder case in this intriguing companion novel to Inspector Chen and the Private Kitchen Murder set in seventh-century China.Judge Dee Renj...

  • Love and Murder in the Time of Covid

    An Inspector Chen Novel - 13

    Former chief inspector Chen faces a tricky serial murderer case at the height of the Covid pandemic - and risks everything he has to expose the deadly effects of the Chinese Communist Party's so-called zero Covid policy to the world.Over two million ...

  • The Conspiracies of the Empire

    A Judge Dee Investigation - 2

    The legendary Judge Dee Renjie returns, in this lyrical combination of mystery, history and ancient Chinese politics from the author of the renowned Inspector Chen mysteriesIn Tang dynasty China, Empress Wu - seductive, ambitious and vindictive - rul...

Award-Winning Books by Qiu Xiaolong

Death of a Red Heroine
2001 Anthony Award -- First Novel


Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Qiu Xiaolong has published 16 books.

Qiu Xiaolong does not have a new book coming out soon. The latest book, The Conspiracies of the Empire, was published in November 2024.

The first book by Qiu Xiaolong, Death of a Red Heroine, was published in June 2000.

Yes. Qiu Xiaolong has 2 series.
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