China Running Dog

Author: Mark Kitto
Publisher: Plum Rain Press
ISBN: 978-626-99173-2-7
Price: 568 NTD (approximately 17.0 USD)

A young man in his early twenties has two basic needs: mates and respect. And a third of course. That's a given and it was there for the taking in Shanghai in the year 2000, a greed-crazed free-for-all in a moral and lawless vacuum created by the Chinese Communist Party.

Johnny Trent, small-time entrepreneur from Basildon in the UK, has neither mates nor respect. That's why he went to China, where he meets Felix Fawcett-Smith, fresh off the boat and from the other side of the tracks. An unlikely friendship begins. Johnny impresses the well-bred Felix with his street smarts until Felix takes Johnny's advice too literally - and too far - and slips into Shanghai's murky underbelly. He enters a world where the Party and power and connections to them are all that matter, where criminals are given sainthoods and saints sent to hell.

Johnny tries to stop Felix's spiral, not least because Felix is taking a sweet, angelic girl, Anita, down with him and Johnny has feelings for Anita that he has never dared to put into words. But Felix thinks he knows best. Like Johnny, all he wants is respect. He gets a lot more, a lot worse.

It's up to Johnny to save whoever he can, besides himself.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mark Kitto has written extensively about China, including two best-selling memoirs, countless articles and some short fiction. China Running Dog is his first novel. It is also an unashamed exposé of an unrepeatable time and place, and the people in it.