Chinatown Beat
by Henry Chang
Summary
Detective Jack Yu grew up in Chinatown. Some of his friends are criminals now; some are dead. Jack has just been transferred to his old neighborhood, where 99 percent of the cops are white. Unlike the others, Jack knows what’s going on.
He is confronted with a serial rapist who preys on young Chinese girls. Then Uncle Four, an elderly and respected Chinatown leader, is gunned down. Jack learns that benevolent Uncle Four had a gorgeous young mistress. And she is missing.
This debut mystery powerfully conveys the sights, sounds, and smells of Chinatown, as well as the attitudes of its inhabitants.
Excerpt
Johnny Wong pulled the black Lincoln over, onto the sidewalk halfway down the narrow street, territory of the Hip Chings. It was nine in the evening and before he could kill the engine they appeared, the stocky mustached man they called Uncle Four and the fragile Hong Kong lady, Mona. They were in the car before he could get out and open the door, the man motioning to him with a jerk of his hand.
“Lotus Blossom Club,” said Uncle Four. The lady was silent as Johnny drove off wondering about her, passing through the nine neon-lit blocks in the rainy Chinatown night.
Uncle Four never said another word until they arrived.
“Come back eleven,” he said. Mona followed him out, then down into the karaoke nightclub, never glancing back. When they were out of view, Johnny slammed the steering wheel hard, pausing for a long moment before urging the car away.
“Dew nei louh mou hei,” he hissed, motherfucker, and soon enough the chopping sound of windshield wipers brought him around to East Broadway, the lower part of town where the radio-car boys gathered and gossiped away the dead ends of their evenings.
They ate, slept, breathed Chinese, these expatriates, and they watched Chinese movies, shopped Chinese supermarkets, got laid in Chinese rub joints.
The laundromat attendant, the bank cashier, the locksmith, the mailman: all spoke Chinese.
The vocabulary of the car boys was limited; every other Chinese phrase rang out motherfucker this, motherfucker that. Whenever they did speak English it was sprinkled in between Chinese sentences, words that sang out: focking got dem, and a lot of cok sooka, molla focker.
Johnny felt superior but comfortable among them. He enjoyed their camaraderie, the spirit they generously shared with him. But he wasn’t like them, and he knew it. They drove their limos because it was an easy enough life to fall into, and they found satisfaction in being their own bosses.
The Taxi and Limousine Commission dealt out franchises for seven thousand dollars, which included the radio hookup and the gypsy plates. Another five hundred dollars for the diamond sticker that allowed them to make pickups from the street. Lease or buy a black sedan. His used Continental had cost ten thousand. A 1990 model. It had eighty thousand miles when he bought it off Jung gor, brother Jung, who got cancer and went to San Francisco to die.
Johnny had labored three hard years for Big Wong’s Construction and Design. Two years as kup yee, the steam presser, in the Rich Fortune sweatshop. Slaving. Saving cash.
All of it went into the car.
The other night drivers had refused to wait tables for long hours, sucking up to the white tourists. They disdained the misery of the market workers and the hard labor of the construction cowboy gangs, choosing instead to gamble and borrow, cheat and steal from their extended families. Their destinations were the racetracks and the gaming parlors, karaoke clubs and airport bars, nightclubs and whorehouses, glamorous places and secret hideaways where they chauffeured their shady clients of the night.
Reprinted with permission of Soho Press. http://www.sohopress.com
Reviews
”A fascinating look at New York’s Chinese-American urban community and its subcultures” –Publishers Weekly
”An intriguing, up-close examination of a closed community”--Booklist
“A classic noir, filled with longing, violence, and that uniquely urban melancholy…A real discovery” —Richard Price, author of Freedomland and Clockers
Author's Biography
Henry Chang was born and raised in Chinatown where he now lives. He is a graduate of Pratt Institute and CCNY and is currently a Security Director.