A Corpse in the Koryo

Inspector O Novels (Volume 1)

James Church

Minotaur/Thomas Dunne Books

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"On the surface, A Corpse in the Koryo is a crackling good mystery novel, filled with unusual characters involved in a complex plot that keeps you guessing to the end."
---Glenn Kessler, The Washington Post 
  
One of Publishers Weekly Top 100 Books of 2006
One of Booklist’s Best Genre Fiction of 2006
One of the Chicago Tribune’s best mystery/thrillers of 2006
 
Sit on a quiet hillside at dawn among the wildflowers; take a picture of a car coming up a deserted highway from the south.
         Simple orders for Inspector O, until he realizes they have led him far, far off his department’s turf and into a maelstrom of betrayal and death. North Korea’s leaders are desperate to hunt down and eliminate anyone who knows too much about a series of decade’s-old kidnappings and murders---and Inspector O discovers too late he has been sent into the chaos. This is a world where nothing works as it should, where the crimes of the past haunt the present, and where even the shadows are real.
         Author James Church weaves a story with beautifully spare prose and layered descriptions of a country and a people he knows by heart after decades as an intelligence officer.
 
“. . . an outstanding crime novel. . . . a not-to-be-missed reading experience. ”
---Library Journal (starred)
 
“Inspector O is completely believable and sympathetic . . . The writing is superb, too . . . richly layered and visually evocative.”
---Booklist (starred)
 
“. . . an impressive debut that calls to mind such mystery thrillers as Martin Cruz Smith’s Gorky Park. . . .”
---Publishers Weekly (starred)

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Chapter 1


No sound but the wind, and in the stingy half-light before day, nothing to see but crumbling highway cutting straight through empty countryside. Laid out straight on a map thirty years ago, straight was how it was to be built. The engineers would have preferred to skirt the small hills that, oddly unconnected, sail like boats across the landscape. Straight, rigorously straight, literally straight, meant blasting a dozen tunnels. That meant an extra year of dangerous, unnecessary work for the construction troops, but there was no serious thought of deviating from the line on

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About the Author

James Church

James Church (pseudonym) is a former Western intelligence officer with decades of experience in Asia.

James Church

Photo: Peter Kolk
James Church

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Available Formats and Book Details

A Corpse in the Koryo
Inspector O Novels (Volume 1)
James Church

Trade Paperback

Trade Paperback
St. Martin's Press
Minotaur/Thomas Dunne Books
September 2007
Trade Paperback
ISBN: 9780312374310
ISBN10: 0312374313
5 1/2 x 8 1/4 inches, 288 pages
$14.95
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Hardcover

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Hardcover
St. Martin's Press
Minotaur/Thomas Dunne Books
October 2006
Hardcover
ISBN: 9780312352080
ISBN10: 0312352085
5/12 x 8 1/4 inches, 288 pages
$23.95

e-Book Agency

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e-Book Agency
St. Martin's Press
Minotaur/Thomas Dunne Books
October 2006
e-Book Agency
ISBN: 9781429936552
ISBN10: 142993655X
5 1/2 x 8 1/4 inches, 288 pages
$9.99
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