The Man with the Baltic Stare by James Church; The Inspector O Novels, Book 4; Unabridged MP3 Audio Book; Narrator Feodor Chin

A Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2010

From the author of the critically acclaimed Inspector O series comes another riveting novel set in the mysterious world of North Korea.

Autumn brings unwelcome news to Inspector O: he has been wrenched from retirement and ordered back to Pyongyang for a final assignment. The two Koreas, he learns, are now cooperating—very quietly—to maintain stability in the North. Stability requires that Inspector O lead an investigation into a crime of passion committed by the young man who has been selected as the best possible leader of a transition government. O is instructed to make sure that the case goes away. Remnants of the old regime, foreign powers, and rival gangs all want a piece of the action, and all make it clear that if O values his life, he will not get in their way. O isn’t sure where his loyalties lie, and he doesn’t have much time to figure out whether ’tis better to be noble or be dead.

“Inspector O is called out of retirement to investigate a murder in Macao. Eventually it becomes clear that the job is not to solve the crime, but to obscure it. This is a police procedural North Korea style—fully inverted. It’s not what you do that lets you get by in North Korea, it’s what you don’t do.”—Economist (London)

“Church once again shows an extraordinary ability to bring that enigmatic country to life, a feat made even more impressive by the wholly plausible near-future setting. Satisfied readers will hail Church as the equal of le Carré.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Each Inspector O novel is a strange new trip through the looking glass, and this one is every bit as praiseworthy as its predecessors.”—Booklist (starred review)

“While publishers comb the fjords for the next Stieg Larsson, readers devoted to bleak international noir would do better to turn their attention from Northern Europe to Asia. North Korea, to be exact.”—Slate.com

James Church is the pseudonym of a former Western intelligence officer with decades of experience in Asia. He has wandered through Korea for years. No matter what hat he wore, Church says, he ran across Inspector O many times.