Royal Thai Police Detective Sonchai Jitpleecheep is called to investigate a crime scene in Bangkok—which quickly reveals itself to be anything but typical in this “intelligent, high-octane psychological thriller" (New York Journal of Books). For one thing, the victim has been beheaded in a bizarre manner, and for another, a message was left in blood. Then Sonchai is summoned to a river in the middle of the night to observe a spectacle that violates everything he holds dear as a Thai, as a Buddhist, and as a human being. A trail of breadcrumbs has been carefully laid out for him, but by whom? Sonchai’s search for answers takes him deep into the Cambodian jungle, where he faces a conspiracy that may implicate the American CIA and the Chinese military—and discovers exactly how far a government will go to protect its worst secrets.

ジョン・バーデットが描く本作は、タイの仏教倫理と冷徹な地政学が火花を散らす、深淵な精神の旅路です。凄惨な事件の背後で、国家という怪物が秘める究極のエゴイズムが暴かれていく様は圧巻。読者は主人公と共に、信仰すら凌駕する権力の狂気と、その濃密な闇に引きずり込まれることになります。 密林の深部で描かれるのは、米中の思惑が渦巻く陰謀と、剥き出しの「人間の業」です。真実を追うほどに深まる魂の葛藤は、現代社会が目を背ける倫理の境界線を鋭く突きつけます。本作は、科学と信仰、そして政治の混迷を鮮烈に描き出した、比類なきサイコスリラーです。