Synopsis
A fast-paced, all-too-real thriller featuring a mother and daughter caught in a global reckoning where family, loyalty, and power collide.
Alice Li, a first-generation Chinese American and former food blogger, has long lived in the shadow of her mother, Vivien Li – a Tiananmen Square dissident turned world-renowned human rights activist and passionate advocate for a free and democratic China.
When security and fire alarms go off simultaneously all around the world, setting off a panic, the signal is traced back to China. As world leaders scramble to respond, Vivien and Alice are called to the White House in hopes Madame Li can interpret the Chinese intentions. But why involve Alice?
If China isn’t behind the attack, Vivien warns, someone even more dangerous is pulling the strings. Mother and daughter must join together to overcome their estrangement if they have any hope of preventing global catastrophe. From DC to Ohio to Hong Kong, they work to prevent the next attack, along the way decoding an ancient legend and uncovering a secret language invented by women, for women.
The Last Mandarin is an electrifying study of absolute power and voracious greed, political terror and personal conviction. But it is also an intimate examination of choice, of sacrifice, of memory and myths, both cultural and personal. It is the story of a mother and daughter, as well as a compelling international thriller about the precarious balance of power across the world, and within a family. And what happens when both break down.
In a world ruled by power, even family can be a weapon.
About the Author
About Louise Penny
Louise Penny is the widely acclaimed author of the Chief Inspector Gamache novels set in her home province of Québec, Canada. Her books have sold more than 18 million copies worldwide, topped American, Canadian and international bestseller lists, and been translated into 35 languages.
Penny’s The Black Wolf is the 20th in the Inspector Gamache series. The novel debuted #1 in Canada, and in the United States on the New York Times and Washington Post lists.
Penny’s first career was as a radio host and journalist with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). She is the recipient of both the Order of Canada and l’Ordre national du Québec, her country’s highest civilian honors. Her husband Michael Whitehead, the former Head of Hematology at the Montreal Children's Hospital, died of dementia in 2016. Her Three Pines Foundation reaches out to those in crisis and offers financial and emotional support, with a special focus on literacy as well as dementia care. Penny lives with her beloved Golden Retrievers in a village south of Montréal.
About Mellissa Fung
Mellissa Fung is a veteran journalist, best-selling author, and award-winning filmmaker. Her last book, Between Good and Evil, debuted on the Canadian best-seller list for non-fiction in April 2023. Fung has traveled the world producing original award-winning documentaries for Al-Jazeera International, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), and TV Ontario, among others. She covered the war in Afghanistan as a field correspondent for the CBC, leading to her best-selling first book, Under an Afghan Sky, which chronicled her experience as a hostage after she was kidnapped while on assignment in Kabul in 2008. Since then, Fung has focused on human rights reporting, returning to Afghanistan again and again, to continue reporting on the challenges that continued to exist there, particularly for women and children. She is also a frequent contributor to The Globe and Mail, and her work has appeared on The Huffington Post, The Toronto Star, TRT, CNN, and PBS. She holds a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University in New York. She was appointed as an officer to the Order of Canada in 2024.
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