Van Gulik's Judge Dee series are fairly unique for the unfamiliar settings and historical Chinese literature his plots are based on. Like the previous books, the good judge is again called to investigate several mysterious cases (all at once), the most interesting being the murder of a retired general in a room locked from the inside.

While the cleverly-woven plots and investigations are the high point of all the books in the series, the wonderful little details of people and life in ancient China are a learning experience as well. The accuracy of these details comes as no surprise as the author was once the Dutch ambassador to China. Highly recommended for fans of classic stories of deduction.

For the uninitiated, Robert van Gulik's Judge Dee mysteries are absolutely brilliant. Van Gulik's Judge Dee (based on a historical character) finds himself involved in murders, barbarian plots, and a plan to overthrow the state in The Chinese Maze Murders. The settings are historically as accurate as can be, since van Gulik was one of the leading experts on China and an expert on Asian affairs, due to his service in the Dutch Foreign Service. All of the Judge Dee mysteries show a great deal of sophistication and detail which is often lacking in the genre.

For those readers who shy away from mysteries because they seem contrived, get this (and The Chinese Bell Murders) and be transported to another time and place. I don't care for mysteries myself, but the history and exotic locales penned by van Gulik made me a fan!

This is much more than a most exciting detective story with different complicated crimes being brilliantly solved. It is also a fascinating glance at the ancient China - a guided tour into the Oriental way of thinking. Written with amazing credibility and expertise, the Judge Dee stories (especially this novel and "The Chinese Bell Murders") are perfectly suited for people with little pre-knowledge who want to learn to understand the Chinese.

I can't find a single flaw about this book. It's plain brilliant.

The annual boat race is a popular tradition in many Chinese cities near rivers and lakes. The festival provides an opporunity for feasting and betting, but in some cases it's an outgrowth of an older tradition. The capricious river goddess will not give good harvests unless celebrated once per year. When a drummer on one of the boats collapses and dies, the old folks are happy--they say that the Goddess claimed her sacrifice.

Suspecting human guilt, Judge Dee investigates--and finds complex stories of greed and passion, plus the legendary theft of an Imperial treasure a century ago.

This is an enjoyable mystery in the classical style--investigation of a puzzle. The story combines eternal human passions--greed, fear, lust--with he exotic culture of China 14 centuries ago. The characters are colorful, the investigation solid, and humor understated--what else would a mystery fan want?

--inotherworlds.com

Judge Dee, a magistate in 7th century China, is forced by the weather to stop at a remote mountain monastery. There, while the storm rages, Dee observes suspicious behavior and hears stories of ghosts and vague accusations of murder.

The investigation shows the judge many secrets, some personal and some criminal, places him in danger of his life, and exposes to the reader the religions and manners of ancient China; surprisingly modern in some respects and almost unimaginable in others.

In the end, Dee's perception of human motivations as well as his logical mind allow him to redress injustice, improve the lives of several young people, and give the reader a solid solution to intellectual puzzles.

A mystery in the classical sense, this concentrates more on the plot than on characters, and gives a well-integrated lecture in history.
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I have read several Judge Dee mysteries and this is one of my favorites. There are a lot of interesting plot twists and some sad and cruel surprises. Judge Dee has the help of Sargeant Hoong in this one, but Ma Joong and Chiao Tai are on leave so Dee must travel to some of the seedier places by himself. I stayed up until late at night to finish this one...enough said.

This is only my second Judge Dee mystery, and although I can't compare it to others by the same author, I am definitely hooked on the series. Robert van Gulik offers a unique avenue into thinking about Tang dynasty China (7th century A.D.) and serves up wonderful escapist fiction at the same time. Judge Dee is a conscientious and clever magistrate faced with the brutal murder of a beautiful courtesan who has complicated political and economic connections. As Judge Dee goes about solving the crime, we learn about pleasure boats, prostitution, what people wore (and didn't wear), insurgencies against the empire, and the necessity of a pot of hot tea whenever the going gets rough. The author was a Dutch diplomat and scholar of Chinese jurisprudence whose mysteries are tailor-made for the historically and culturally curious.

I usually read mysteries set in the 20s-40s with a female heroine. I picked this up randomly and LOVED it! My copy is not the one shown here, but it is the 1960 version. My copy has illustrations of the town and the boat which were very helpful. This story taught me a lot about ancient China - fascinating - without being didactic at all! There were several mysteries wound into this one little book so there was plenty to keep you entertained. It was very suspenseful. I also learned some life lessons from Judge Dee. :)

The third novel in Robert Van Gulik's historical mystery series about a crime-solving Imperial District Magistrate in seventh-century China, sees Judge Dee transferred to the small town of Han-Yuan, along with his family and assistants - Sergeant Hoong, Ma Joong and Chiao Tai. Han-Yuan is only sixty miles from the imperial capital; however it is a small town cut off from most of the world as it surrounded by mountains. The town lies on the shore of a mountain lake which town locals whisper, holds mysterious, even supernatural forces. The novel opens with Judge Dee attending a banquet in his honor on a flower-boat - a floating house of prostitution. At the end of the evening, the judge discovers a famous local courtesan lying dead in the lake water! The suspects are many, since all of Han-Yuan's prominent citizens were attending the party and most of them had a plausible reason for wishing this courtesan dead. Judge Dee has to sort through confusing clues and his task is made more complicated by the sudden disappearance of a new bride and her husband, the violent death of a local carpenter and the suspicions that Han-Yuan may be a center for political unrest! The judge is able to sort through all the confusion and the realization that these multiple crimes are all inter-connected, with his usual blend of wisdom and sagacity. Judge Dee is a very interesting character and the novel itself paints a wonderfully evocative picture of ancient China with its complicated rituals of love and marriage and precise social order that governed everyone's life. The mystery itself is interesting, though perhaps a little too twisty; however, the ending is genuinely powerful and completely plausible. A must-read for fans of the series!

If I were just learning how to write this would be a prefect example. Forty five percent of the book is description. Who cares if Judge Dee has three or four hairs growing out of the mole on his face? And evidently he prefers girls with bushy eyebrows.

Other than that it could be a decent mystery if it did not drag on and on. This may be due to the story being a little too short to publish; it took up three cassettes. The mystery its self is O.K. there is no last minute butlers to show up and confess. Evidently this is part of some Judge Dee series. So someone must like his style.

The story takes place in a monastery where Judge Dee just happens to be passing during a storm and need a place to stay with his three wives. He whiteness some impossible things and meets some mysterious people.

Nice short mystery. You'll be grateful to Van Gulik for giving his characters, from Sixth Century China, such a naturalness of expression. You'll never be bored by forced idioms, just as you'll never be asked to sit helplessly by as obvious differences between that culture and ours get exploited to the realm of the cliche (for instance, Judge Dee's three wives actually get along and are a natural part of the plot). Trouble is, the plot's a bit pedestrian when all's said and done -- a very formula production (as, let's admit it, are most mysteries).

An unexpected storm forces Judge Dee and his three, (yes three!) wives to seek shelter at a Taoist monastery. The wives go straight to bed but the Judge must pay his respects to the abbot before joining them. Thus begins a frantic night of murder and mayhem during which Judge Dee, suffering from a bad head cold, must solve a series of murders, rescue a maiden in distress and arrange for the villain to meet his just deserts, bringing together two sets of star-crossed lovers along the way. "I should give up being a magistrate and become a match-maker!" he grumbles. One of the best of the series.

Judge Dee is an imperial magistrate who travels the country solving mysteries and murders. Not content merely to judge cases as they come to court, Judge Dee investigates crimes himself.

Now Chief Lord Justice, Judge Dee is sent undercover to the city of Canton. His job: to find out what happened to the Court Censor. Was he murdered or has he disappeared for other reasons? Dealing with practised and conniving Imperial Court intriguers, Dee finds the case complicated as a host of foreigners are involved including a mysterious Arab with a curved sword and an exotic belly dancer. Undaunted, and with the help of his officers, the loyal Tao Gan and Chiao Tai, Dee sets out to unravel the case.

Judge Dee was practising in the 7th century but the writer, Robert Van Gulik, was a Dutch diplomat living in China in the early 20th Century. Interested in Chinese history, he decided to write a series of detective novel based old Chinese stories. Beautifully written, each Judge Dee story is a pearl of literature. The English is beautiful yet modern, easy to read yet evocative of the China that existed over 20 centuries ago.

This book is part of Van Gulik's unique series of Judge Dee novels which chronicle the cases investigated by the famous magistrate of classical Chinese detective stories. A staple of the Judge Dee stories are the multi-layered plot and accurate historical details of ancient Chinese culture and practices and this book does not disappoint in both areas.

In this chapter of the series, Judge Dee is assigned to the city of Canton to investigate the disappearance and subsequent murder of a Chinese noble. Numerous side plots are thrown into the mix, involving a blind cricket-catcher and mysterious Arabian assassins. All of which the Judge slowly unravels using ingenuity and plain, old-fashioned deductive prowess which is the highlight of all the books in the series.

One of the most interesting things about Van Gulik's Judge Dee books is that the Judge is usually juggling three or four mysteries at once. Your brain definitely stays awake as he shifts his attention from one to the other. "The Red Pavilion" takes place on "Paradise Island", a town in which the main industry is the selling of pleasure--sort of a Las Vegas of ancient China. Between current murders and murders of the past, the Judge has his hands full, and with only one of his usual four assistants he is a busy guy.

I enjoyed the interesting characters of the various courtesans, bouncers, businessmen, and mysterious beggars no end. His Excellency is not beyond making a guess at a solution and then proving himself wrong, which is quite refreshing in detective novels. If you like detective novels combined with ancient culture, you may well enjoy these books.

Oriental sleuth Judge Dee, based on a historical character, is brought to life in 'The Red Pavilion'. While Judge Dee shares many traits with traditional quirky Western detectives, this novel has a definite Chinese feel. The cultural interplay is very interesting, and allows for different scenarios than the typical mystery. A nice change of pace.

A storm forces Judge Dee to stay overnight in a Taoist temple. There he finds he must investigate the poisoning of one religious young woman, the disappearance of two other women, a possible ghost, a possibly murdered abbot, and numerous suspicious living men and women. All his questions are answered, but administering justice strains his moral code.

I found this book rather dull perhaps because I generally dislike "period" mysteries. A few clever paragraphs to be sure, but in between these were alot of somewhat stereotypical characterizations and forgettable dialogue. Those who enjoy period pieces and all their assumptions and artificiality may like this novel but I did not.

"Necklace and Calabash" initiates the third Judge Dee series, which Heinemann Publishers dubbed as "More Judge Dee Mysteries". This third and last series was conceived at the beginning of 1966 in Tokyo so that van Gulik would explore more directly the character of Judge Dee, who would solve cases without the help of his assistants. "Necklace and Calabash" proved to be the penultimate Judge Dee Mystery.

As van Gulik notes in the book's postscript, the calabash or bottle gourd has played an important role in Chinese philosophy and art. In "Necklace and Calabash" Judge Dee, the quintessential Confucianist, meets a Taoist monk who emphasizes to him the importance of emptiness - as in the emptiness of a calabash. With the pressure mounting on a timely solution to the theft of a princess's pearl necklace, Judge Dee empties himself and discovers the key to the mystery.

Once the puzzles are solved, Judge Dee springs into action. In his temporary exalted position as Imperial Inquisitor, he conducts himself with equanimity, even when dealing with the highest officials of the Water Palace; incorruptible, he dispatches the cases fearlessly and unmoved by temptations of wealth or status.

This isn't the kind of book to pick up if you're looking for an intricate mystery full of twists and reversals, or for a thriller that will keep you eagerly turning the pages in a rush of excitement and dread. Good ol' Judge Dee doesn't really have to knock himself out too much to solve this problem; the clues and confessions practically come crawling and whimpering to him.

But if you're interested in a different setting than usual, this might be your...um...cup of tea. It's set in a China of hundreds of years ago, with a society that's different from the West in many of its attitudes but all too similar in basic human fears and needs.

The characterization is not too deep, but you can find a good amount of material here about customs and clothing and buildings and food. The period details, in other words, are really more important than the plot.

This is a good tool for a fantasy role-player doing some research for her next character. Or, if you only have a couple of hours and you need something to read, this slim little volume is not a bad choice. Just don't expect to be blown away in wonder.

As far as plot goes, this book isn't all that great. Van Gulik wrote his Judge Dee stories in his spare time and apparantly didn't have a lot of it. What makes this book worth reading, though, is the impecable recreation of classical Chinese society and Confucian social structure. That being kept in mind, this book is a worthy read.

This is one of the first chronological detective adventures of Judge Dee. The judge is visiting one place and gets involved in several murder cases. It follows the classical structure: independent plots in the traditional Chinese detective story style. The lacquer screen is presented as a supernatural object but Dee manages to return it to everyday world. A book recommended for the Van Gulik followers.