Overview

A Christian Science Monitor Best Book of the Year From the award-winning author of Waiting and War Trash: a riveting tale of espionage and conflicted loyalties that spans half a century in the entwined histories of two countries--China and the United States--and two families. When Lilian Shang, born and raised in America, discovers her father's diary after the death of her parents, she is shocked by the secrets it contains. She knew that her father, Gary, convicted decades ago of being a mole in the CIA, was the most important Chinese spy ever caught. But his diary, an astonishing chronicle of his journey as a Communist intelligence agent, reveals the pain and longing that his double life entailed--and point to a hidden second family that he'd left behind in China. As Lilian follows her father's trail back into the Chinese provinces, she begins to grasp the extent of his dilemma: he is a man torn between loyalty to his motherland and the love he came to feel for his adopted country. She sees how his sense of duty distorted his life, and as she starts to understand that Gary too had been betrayed, Lilian finds that it is up to her to prevent his tragedy from endangering yet another generation of Shangs. A stunning portrait of a multinational family and an unflinching inquiry into the meaning of citizenship, patriotism, and home, A Map of Betrayal is a spy novel that only Ha Jin could write. From the Hardcover edition.

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9781322244969

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Reviews

Beautifully written. . . . Brilliant fiction, a story of shifting personal loyalties across broad swaths of territory, that can only be done by one with a deep knowledge of two cultures: in [Jin's] case, China and America. --Michael D. Langan, Buffalo News Ha Jin presents a chillingly matter-of-fact tale of espionage and treachery told in alternating narratives. . . . [As this] brooding, many-layered story of delusion and betrayal suspensefully unfolds, Ha Jin offers startlingly redefining views of the strategic evolution of U.S.-Chinese relations during the nuclear arms race, the Korean and Vietnam Wars, and Ping-Pong diplomacy. A sharply ironic, stealthily devastating tale of the tragic cost of 'blind' patriotism, told by a master of clarifying fiction, uniting the personal and the geopolitical. -- Booklist (starred) Like his exquisite National Book Award-winning Waiting, Jin's latest is a meticulous observation of a manipulated life only partially lived. . . . [Jin] deftly plots a family history caught between uncompromising attachments and inevitable betrayals. Spy story it may be, but what lingers is the immeasurable human toil. -- Library Journal (starred) From the National Book Award- and PEN/Faulkner-winning author Jin ( Waiting ) comes a woman's inquisition into the limits of her father's loyalty to his nation and family. . . . Jin's subtle prose entrances. . . . A captivating tale that probes the Chinese political state over the past half century. -- Publishers Weekly (boxed, starred) Masterful and bittersweet storytelling that operates on a number of different levels . . . Satisfies like the best of John le Carre, similarly demystifying and deglamorizing the process of gathering information and the ambiguous morality that operates in shades of gray . . . The issues of love and loyalty that permeate the novel aren't merely political, but deeply personal. --Kirkus Reviews (starred)

Author Information

HA JIN left his native China in 1985 to attend Brandeis University. He is the author of six novels, four story collections, three volumes of poetry, and a book of essays. He has received the National Book Award, two PEN/Faulkner Awards, the PEN/Hemingway Foundation Award, the Asian American Literary Award, and the Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction. In 2014 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Ha Jin lives in the Boston area and is a professor of English at Boston University.

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