Inside the Red Mansion: On the Trail of China's Most Wanted Man

This book combines a portrait of China's exhilarating social and economic transformation with one of its underbelly, which in Oliver August's telling proves to be sleazy, gaudy, and often very funny. Many of the characters whom the author meets and chronicles during his time in China demonstrate the same breathtaking entrepreneurial daring and wild imaginativeness as the book's supposed antagonist, the bandit king Lai. By comparison, the American robber barons of old seem boring, their aspirations staid. But "Inside the Red Mansion" raises serious issues too, particularly in its implication that the Chinese government plays a dangerous game with those on the front lines of capitalism in that country. Just who controls whom, and how long the government can continue to pull all the strings before the puppet collapses - or breaks free and dances on its own - are real and urgent questions, and this book provides a lot of food for thought along with its colorful and constantly surprising narrative.

Tracking China's super-smuggler, Oliver August manages to capture the breadth and speed of change in modern China. August is by turns intrepid in his mission and charming in his account of his findings, as his search takes him from a foie gras farm where goose livers are grown as large as beefsteaks; to a golf course where games unfold at midnight between drunken competitors attended by girl caddies in hot pants; to an upscale holding cell (when the Chinese police interrogate him in a hotel room). The portrait of China that emerges from this informative book is lovingly-rendered in August's wry, winking prose. A fast read, this book is a must for anyone interested in China and the impact it's having on the world.

Few books are as good as Oliver August's Inside The Red Mansion. For anyone interested in the development of China, or just wanting a fascinating and gripping story, they should look no further than this book. Written with consummate skill, Inside the Red Mansion will be a favorite for years to come. The story is well researched by an accomplished and vivacious writer and is as much a thriller as a commentary on modern China. Hard to put down, yet insightful, worldly and sometimes just downright funny.

an amazing thrilling yet true expose of the adventures behind the scenes in contempary "communist" China by an author who has clearly spent a great deal of time there.