In Edward Whittemore's masterful and surreal alternate history, a man's search for answers about his vanished parents propels him on an odyssey from the present into the past, from a bar in the Bronx to Tokyo and Shanghai during the Second World War. Quin, born in China and raised in the Bronx, is orphaned in the closing days of the Second World War when his parents go missing and are presumed dead in Shanghai. Years later, in a Bronx bar, Quin encounters a stranger who hints that he can uncover the secrets of his past by accompanying Big Gobi, an adult orphan too simpleminded to travel alone, on a journey to meet his guardian in Tokyo. Quin arrives in Japan determined to uncover the truth about his parents' past, but his search soon raises more questions than answers. What are the connections between a Russian anarchist, a one-eyed baron who is head of the Japanese secret service known as the Kempeitai, and the atrocities committed during the rape of Nanking? And what does any of it have to do with Quin's parents? Part espionage novel and part surreal fantasy, Quin's Shanghai Circus, the first novel by Edward Whittemore, is a remarkable and audacious literary feat. Alive with a fascinating cast of characters and equally enthralling turns of events, former CIA officer Whittemore offers readers a mesmerizing glimpse at a secret history of the twentieth century.

Quin's Shanghai Circus

Science Fiction & Fantasy

WHITTEMORE, Edward

Science Fiction

HOLT. RINEHART AND WINSTON

On the last day of December 1921, three enigmatic men - Cairo Martyr, a blue-eyed African who controls the Middle East's supply of aphrodisiac mummy dust; O'Sullivan Beare, a former Irish patriot and gunrunner who has made a fortune selling spurious, phallic-shaped Christian artifacts; and Mark Szondi, a dedicated Zionist who wagers only fried fish futures - sit down to a fateful game of poker in the back room of a Jerusalem antiquities shop owned by a 3000-year-old knight errant. The Great Jerusalem Poker Game as it came to be called, would last twelve years and had as its stake nothing less than control of Jerusalem itself…

Jerusalem Poker

Fantasy

Henry Holt Co.

In 1941, a hand grenade explodes in a Cairo bar, taking the life of Stern, a petty gunrunner and morphine addict. His death could easily go unnoticed as Rommel's tanks charge through the desert in an attempt to open the Middle East to Hitler's forces. Yet the mystery behind Stern's death is a top priority for intelligence experts. Master spies from three countries converge on Joe O'Sullivan Beare, who is closer to Stern than anyone, in an effort to unravel the disturbing puzzle. The search for the truth about Stern leads O'Sullivan Beare through the slums of Cairo to a decaying former brothel called the Hotel Babylon.

Nile Shadows

Sinai Tapestry, the brilliant first novel of the Jerusalem Quartet, is an epic alternate history of the Middle East in which the discovery of the original Bible links a disparate group of remarkable people across time and space. In 1840, Plantagenet Strongbow, the twenty-ninth Duke of Dorset, seven-feet-seven-inches tall and the greatest swordsman and botanist of Victorian England, walks away from the family estate and disappears into the Sinai Desert carrying only a large magnifying glass and a portable sundial. He emerges forty years later as an Arab holy man and anthropologist, now the author of a massive study of Levantine sex—and the secret owner of the Ottoman Empire. Meanwhile, Skanderbeg Wallenstein has discovered the original Bible, lost on a dusty bookshelf in the monastery library. To his amazement, it defies every truth held by the three major religions. Nearly a century later, Haj Harun, an antiquities dealer who has acted as guardian of the Holy City for three thousand years, uncovers the hidden Bible. Sinai Tapestry is the first volume of the Jerusalem Quartet, which continues with Jerusalem Poker, Nile Shadows, and Jericho Mosaic.

Sinai Tapestry: A Novel

Literature & Fiction

Literary

Sinai Tapestry, the brilliant first novel of the Jerusalem Quartet, is an epic alternate history of the Middle East in which the discovery of the original Bible links a disparate group of remarkable people across time and space. In 1840, Plantagenet Strongbow, the twenty-ninth Duke of Dorset, seven-feet-seven-inches tall and the greatest swordsman and botanist of Victorian England, walks away from the family estate and disappears into the Sinai Desert carrying only a large magnifying glass and a portable sundial. He emerges forty years later as an Arab holy man and anthropologist, now the author of a massive study of Levantine sex—and the secret owner of the Ottoman Empire. Meanwhile, Skanderbeg Wallenstein has discovered the original Bible, lost on a dusty bookshelf in the monastery library. To his amazement, it defies every truth held by the three major religions. Nearly a century later, Haj Harun, an antiquities dealer who has acted as guardian of the Holy City for three thousand years, uncovers the hidden Bible. Sinai Tapestry is the first volume of the Jerusalem Quartet, which continues with Jerusalem Poker, Nile Shadows, and Jericho Mosaic.

Sinai Tapestry

AVON.

Self-Help

Relationships

Searching the Orient for clues to his parents' World War II activities, Quin encounters an incarnate female Buddha, a sadistic arch criminal, and other grotesque symbols of human history

Classics

Avon/Books

This novel about the rivalries and crosscurrents of the Middle East focuses on a Jewish double-agent who has become a trusted adviser to Syria's military leaders

Jericho Mosaic

United States

W.W. Norton & Co., Inc.

This is an espionage novel full of bizarre imagery and complex plot twists.

Old Earth Books

Contemporary

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by WHITTEMORE, Edward. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by WHITTEMORE, Edward

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by WHITTEMORE, Edward. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Quin's Shanghai Circus

Jerusalem Poker

Nile Shadows

Sinai Tapestry: A Novel

Sinai Tapestry

Jerusalem Poker

Quin's Shanghai Circus

Jericho Mosaic

Quin's Shanghai Circus

Sinai Tapestry