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GHOST SHIFT
by John Gapper
Ballantine Books, January 2015
320 pages
$26.00
ISBN: 0345527925


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Set in present-day China, John Gapper's GHOST SHIFT is a compelling thriller with shifting identities and complex plot elements. A young woman's body is discovered in a marsh. She has drowned, it seems--but possibly she was murdered. SongMei, a member of a Chinese elite investigation unit called the Commission for Discipline, is ordered to view the body, although she is only a student. An important official, nicknamed the Wolf, has required Mei to be there and view the body. As the events unfold, the mystery deepens. What she sees is both puzzling and terrifying. The dead woman looks just like her.

The totalitarian nature of Chinese rule is evident throughout. The Party manipulates people and the truth. Mei seems to be part of a set-up to discredit the Wolf and make it seem that he is corrupt. Before he is arrested, he asks her to find the father of the dead girl. This request leads Mei into a series of dark adventures that involve murder, escape to America, corporate espionage and torture. The Chinese company, Poppy, which manufactures a fictitious tablet seemingly modeled after Apple's I Pad, is at the root of the evil. It seems that young workers are committing suicide by jumping from the plant's roof. But their deaths may be murder, not suicide. Mei wants to find the truth about her own family and that leads her into a situation where she must also find the truth about Poppy.

The tale is gripping, and Song Mei is a sympathetic character, but the other characters are not fully realized and often are hard to keep track of. This confusion may be because some of them are introduced with two Chinese names but then are referred to by only one. In any case, they have abilities that seem hard to believe, including various feats of physical strength, gun proficiency, and connections that yield escape helicopters and mansions in which to hide.

In spite of these shortcomings, GHOST SHIFT is an engrossing read. Gapper puts Mei into dangerous situations as she goes undercover and her survival is often in doubt. We willingly follow her bold and risky undertakings and wait for the story of her background and that of the dead girl to unfold.

§ Anne Corey is a writer, poet, teacher and botanical artist in New York's Hudson Valley.

Reviewed by Anne Corey, June 2015

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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