[Inspector Chen Cao 08] • El Enigma De China

Chief Inspector Chen Cao of the Shanghai Police Department is in an unusual

situation—a poet by training and inclination, he was assigned by the party to

the Police Department after he graduated college, where he has continued to

shine.  Now he’s a rising cadre in the party, in line to take over the top

politic position in the police department, while being one of most respected

policeman in the department. Which is why he’s brought in by the Party to sign

off on the investigation into the death of Zhou Keng.

Zhou Keng—a trusted princeling, son of a major party member—was head of the

Shanghai Housing Development Committee when a number of his corrupt practices

were exposed on the internet.  Removed from his position and placed into

extra-legal detention, Zhou apparently hanged himself while under guard. While

the Party is anxious to have Zhou’s death declared a suicide, and for the

renowned Chief Inspector Chen to sign off on that conclusion, the sequence of

events don’t quite add up. Now Chen will have to decide what to do—investigate

the death as a possible homicide and risk angering unseen powerful people, or

seek the justice that his position requires him to strive for.