Death Doesn't Forget
Ed Lin
ISBN: 9781641293273
Published: July 2022
Pricing
Hardcover $27.95
More books by Ed Lin
Description
Jing-nan, owner of a popular night market food stall, is framed for a string of high-profile murders—why does it seem like he's always the one left holding the skewer? The fourth entry to Ed Lin's Taipei mystery series is as hilarious and poignant as ever.
Taipei is rocked by the back-to-back murders of a recent lott...
Jing-nan, owner of a popular night market food stall, is framed for a string of high-profile murders—why does it seem like he’s always the one left holding the skewer? The fourth entry to Ed Lin’s Taipei mystery series is as hilarious and poignant as ever.
Taipei is rocked by the back-to-back murders of a recent lottery winner and a police captain just as the city is preparing to host the big Austronesian Cultural Festival, which has brought in indigenous performers from all around the Pacific Rim to the island nation of Taiwan. Jing-nan, the proprietor of Unknown Pleasures, a popular food stand at Taipei’s largest night market, is thrown into the intrigue. Is he being set up to take the rap, or will he be the next victim? The fallout could jeopardize Jing-nan’s relationship with his girlfriend, Nancy, who is herself soon caught up in the drama, and is increasingly annoyed at Jing-nan’s failure to propose to her.
Jing-nan also has to be careful not to alienate his trusty workers Dwayne and Frankie the Cat, who are facing their own personal trials. Dwayne struggles to reconnect with his roots as a person of aboriginal descent, while septuagenarian Frankie helps a fellow veteran with dementia, intertwining stories that illuminate decades of Taiwanese history.
Jing-nan, meanwhile, has to untangle the mystery of the killings while keeping his food stall afloat against hip new competition. Both his life, and his Instagram follower count, hang in the balance.
Media
“[An] inventively humanistic work, one with welcome instances of love, religious questioning (through a variety of faiths) and one terrifically effective episode of magical surrealism.”
—Tom Nolan, The Wall Street Journal
“There is a marvelously mordant quality to Ed Lin’s novels, which combine depictions of the darkest criminality with a sense of the absurd.”
—Sarah Weinman, The New York Times Book Review
“A master of Taipei noir [Ed Lin] proves every good crime novel is a social novel . . . What differentiates Death Doesn’t Forget is its sense not of despair but of equanimity. The future is unwritten, in other words; it must be lived to be revealed.”
—David L. Ulin, Los Angeles Times
“Instead of a picture postcard view that tourists might get of museums, memorial halls and tea houses of Taipei, Author Lin offers us a slice of the gritty street life there. As a bonus, he makes us aware of the social and political challenges faced by this island nation.”
—International Examiner
“As addictive as the marinated, savory skewers sold at protagonist Jing-nan’s food stand ‘Unknown Pleasures’ . . . Death Doesn’t Forget is serio-comic; more of rollicking picaresque caper novel than crime story, reminiscent of fiction by the versatile late Donald E. Westlake and Carl Hiaasen.”
—BookTrib
“Ed Lin weaves a funny and biting picture of Taiwan’s political and social fabric, commenting on its disenfranchised — and most importantly, its food . . . Simply impressive.”
—Taipei Times
“For fans of amateur sleuths who want to armchair travel while armchair sleuthing.”
—Book Riot
“We’re treated to Lin’s always wonderful array of characters, bits of Taiwanese history, and explanations of the current political scene—all without feeling like we’re in school. Lin is definitely a satirist, but this novel is deeply poignant at the same time.”
—First Clue
“Death Doesn’t Forget may be your first Ed Lin novel, but it surely won’t be your last. Lin is a master of conveying a lot of fascinating information via a toe-tapping plot and characters who are realistic, flawed, pragmatic and deeply immersed in a society and culture that’s engagingly foreign to US readers.”
—The Agony Column
“This mystery has the same big pluses and small minus as the earlier ones by Ed Lin: The plot is lively, the characters unusual and well motivated, and the scenes are intriguing and unusual . . . For any shelf of Taiwan or international crime fiction, Ed Lin’s books are a must. They hold up to re-reading, too.”
—Kingdom Books
“Lin’s signature rollicking mixture of wink-wink noir and impossible fortuity is again on full display, balancing just enough chill with plenty of thrill. Murder is never funny, but at least a chuckle here and a guffaw there can’t hurt the corpses.”
—Shelf Awareness
“With its great suspense and plot development, Death Doesn’t Forget is good fun all-round.”