Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance (USA 2005)

From the Publisher:
"It was while jogging along the beach just east of the Paradise Cove pier that Artie Wu tripped over a dead pelican, fell, and met the man with six greyhounds." - from Chinaman's Chance

Thus begins what may be the most popular of Ross Thomas's unique stories. The combination of Wu, pretender to the Imperial throne of China, and Quincy Durant, who has his own colorful past, makes for a heady experience. After starting with the deceased pelican on a California beach, the plot mixes in the disappearance of a large sum of money that should have been buried in Vietnam, and the search for the missing member of a trio of singing sisters from the Ozarks. Only Thomas could have stirred this concoction with the style, humor, and suspense that captures the reader at the very beginning and doesn't let go until the last word.

Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance. Introduction by William Heffernan. Thomas Dunne Books, ISBN: 0312334141 (February, 2005), 320 p., $14.95.

Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance (USA 1991)

From the Publisher:
The scene: Southern California, the beach at Malibu, the sleazier sides of Venice and the city of Pelican Bay.
The motivation: power and money.
The characters: a missing woman, a dead congressman, a multimillionaire, a Mafia boss and his old college roommate, formerly of the CIA.
The problem: who is setting up whom for what?

Enter Artie Wu and Quincy Durant, two con men who bring with them a wealth of experience and a number of people who don't mind helping out if the money's right.

It's a complex situation that races from Vietnam to Dallas, Washington to Los Angeles -- and comes home to roost in Pelican Bay and a struggle for power.

Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance. Mysterious Press, ISBN: 0445407255 (November, 1991), 347 p., $4.99.

Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance (USA 1988)

From the Publisher:
The scene: Southern California, the beach at Malibu, the sleazier sides of Venice and the city of Pelican Bay.
The motivation: power and money.
The characters: a missing woman, a dead congressman, a multimillionaire, a Mafia boss and his old college roommate, formerly of the CIA.
The problem: who is setting up whom for what?

Enter Artie Wu and Quincy Durant, two con men who bring with them a wealth of experience and a number of people who don't mind helping out if the money's right.

It's a complex situation that races from Vietnam to Dallas, Washington to Los Angeles -- and comes home to roost in Pelican Bay and a struggle for power.

Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance. Mysterious Press, ISBN: 0445407255 (July, 1988), 347 p., $4.50.

Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance (USA 1979)

From the Publisher:
"A HELTER-SKELTER ONSLAUGHT OF EVENTS THAT LEAVES THE READER BREATHLESS." NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
It was a million-dollar con game with a missing blonde named Silk in the middle. Playing it to the hilt were two elegant rogues: Quincy Durant, a wire-hard adventurer with a world of experience from Bangkok to L.A.; and his enterprising accomplice, Artie Wu, the pretender of the throne of Imperial China.

A Malibu midas proffered a staggering fee to find Silk. But there was a catch: a bundle of cold-blooded henchmen were looking too. And if they found her first, all the muscle in Venice Beach couldn't put her back together.

CHINAMAN'S CHANCE is vintage fiction by a master -- a hard-fast thriller that speeds across a sunbleached paradise to an unguessable, triple-cross, pure shock ending...

Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance. Avon Books, ISBN: 0380415178 (March, 1979), 334 p., $2.25.

Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance (USA 1978)

From the Publisher:
"Ross Thomas combines the compassion of Ross Macdonald and the keen descriptive insight of John D. McDonald with the toughness of James M. Cain and the eary breezy style of Rex Stout. Added to all thas to a wit all his own." - Brian Garfield

The scene is Southern Calfornia: the beach at Malibu; the sleazier sides of Venice and the city of Pelican Bay. The situation: power and money. The characters: a missing woman, a dead Congressman, a multimillionaire, a Mafia boss and his old college roommate, late of the CIA. The problem: who is setting up whom for what. Enter Artie Wu and Quincy Durant, two men who bring with them a wall of experience in surviving and a colorful world of people who don't mind helping out if the money's right. Its a complex situation that spans half the world, from Vietnam to Dallas, Washington to Los Angeles. It's a plot that covers twenty years and comes home to roost in Pelican Bay and a struggle for power.

Ross Thomas tells an exciting story that keeps you off guard and guessing all the way; and as The New York Times Book Review said, "Any Ross Thomas novel is fast-paced, smoothly written and brightly observant.

Chinaman's Chance is exciting and entertaining. It's also very real. Ross Thomas understand corruption, the layers of incident and event that lead people to a moment of decision, and the far-flung elements that lead to confrontation.

Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance. A Novel. Simon and Schuster, ISBN: 0671240706 (February, 1978), 383 p., $9.95.