Product Description

When a headless corpse is found by a prison work gang on a windy Tibetan mountainside, veteran police inspector, Shan Tao Yun might seem the perfect man to solve the crime - except that he himself is serving an indefinite sentence in the gulag for offending the Party in Beijing. Desperate to close the case before an American tourist delegation arrives, the district commander has no choice but to grant him a temporary release. Embittered about everything except his compulsion to find the truth, the brilliant Shan faces an ultimatum: solve the case fast and in a politcally expedient fashion, or the Tibetan priests in his work brigade will be punished. Shan is thrown into a maelstrom of intrigue involving American mining interests, Tibetan sorcerers, corrupt party officials, a secret illegal monastery and much more.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #260620 in Books
• Published on: 2000-11-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Once, Shan was the brightest investigator of financial corruption in Beijing; he asked the wrong questions and is serving an indefinite sentence in a labour brigade in Tibet where he has learned to love and revere the ageing monks who toil beside him. When the local prosecutor is found without his head, Shan is pulled from his barracks and obliged to investigate.

"On what grounds do you refuse, Comrade Prisoner?"

Shan did not reply. On the grounds that I cannot lie for you, he wanted to say. On the grounds that my soul has been worn to thin threads by people like you. On the grounds that the last time I tried to find the truth for someone like you I was sent to the gulag for my trouble...

Tan slowly drained his tea and shrugged. "Still, you are not permitted to refuse."

With Prosecutor Jao the fourth senior official to be killed, is there a Tibetan nationalist conspiracy? Or are the monks right to fear the return of Tamdin, demon of protective vengeance? And what is the role of the American geologists Rebecca and Kincaid? Shan is determined to find the truth before the army starts shooting his labour brigade, but wherever he turns he finds himself caught up in the contradictions of Chinese rule and his own conflicting loyalties...

This is a powerful and moving thriller whose polemic against Chinese rule in Tibet and admiration for the traditions of Tibetan Buddhism never takes over from breakneck tension and the slow deliberate unravelling of a complex and ingenious plot. The more we read, the more we are caught up in the cold chill of high plateaux and betrayal; we learn with Shan to trust nobody, and be surprised by unlikely virtue. --Roz Kaveney

Sunday Telegraph
Vivid, absorbing, intriguing.

Guardian
A cocktail of action adventure…a great read.

Customer Reviews

definitely a good read , especially for Tibet lovers
The Skull Mantra is the best read for both thillers and Tibet lovers. It keeps you reading with the intrigue of the plot itself as well as with all the magic the writer succeeds in trasmitting of Tibet, its people and buddhism. Despite the tragic set of the story - mainly a prison camp for Tibetans - and the rendering of the appalling conditions which Tibetans are submitted to by the Chinese invaders, the book is pervaded and can transmit a sense of joyful acceptance of life as it is, the joy which reaching one's true inner self represents. Besides being a good thriller, this is also the story of the protagonist, funnily a Chinese who though turns out to be a true tibetan in both way of living and way of thinking, and who, prisoner among tibetan prisoners, is forced by the Chinese authorities to solve a series of crimes perpetrated against Chinese government representatives. Eliot, please hurry up! I do look forward to your second best seller!

Raises the bar for the genre. Superb.
Eliot Pattison stands head and shoulders above most authors writing mysteries and thrillers today. No. I take that back. He towers over them. I haven't been this excited about a new author in years. Fusing elements of police procedural and pedal-to-the-metal thriller, all flawlessly integrated with the remote Tibetan setting, "The Skull Mantra" is our introduction to dogged, unassuming Shan Tao Yun, a former Inspector in Beijing who has subsequently spent years as a political prisoner alongside lamas and freedom fighters. He is temporarily released for a specific purpose: to solve a murder that has occurred near the labor camp. However, he soon comes close to despair as it begins to appear that the murder was a demon.

Pattison is a first-class prose stylist. The story flows quickly and smoothly, untangling the mystery one revelation at a time, yet the author doesn't skimp on the visual detail that is necessary to bring this remote setting to life for readers who have never been there. The characterizations are economical and realistic. The monks and lamas make utterly sympathetic martyrs -- one of the hardest literary tricks to pull off. Pattison does it effortlessly, and I think this is because he believes whereof he writes: "The Skull Mantra," like its sequels, is a field guide to the dying practices of Tibetan Buddhism, suffused with the author's political indignation over the fate of the minorities who have the misfortune to live within the boundaries of modern China. My sole reservation about Pattison's writing is that he occasionally demonizes Beijing and mainstream Chinese culture. You start to think, "Oh come on, it can't really be as bad as all that!" However, that these doubts arise at all is a testament to Pattison's intimacy with his material: it is a rare thriller that feels as convincing as nonfiction. For sheer authoritativeness, "The Skull Mantra" bears comparison to "The Constant Gardener" and "The Quiet American." Higher praise than that there is none. So, hats off to Eliot Pattison, and let's hope he keeps writing.

Brilliant - couldn't put it down
Wonderful story and characters that came to life - I was there as Shan tried against great odds to solve the murder - but it also told me so much about Buddhism and life in Tibet that I am now hooked and want to learn more.