Judge Dee was a 7th century Chinese magistrate and statesman, of the Tang Dynasty. His cases were recorded in the Imperial archives, but most have not survived. In the 18th century, three cases were written into an anonymous Chinese mystery novel, Dee Goong An. Mystery novels were a popular Chinese genre, but usually with a strong supernatural element that Robert van Gulik thought would be unacceptable to western readers. Dee Goong An mostly lacks that element, and in 1949, van Gulik translated it into English. After that, he wrote his own entirely fictional adventures of Judge Dee, but this book is the only place to find the historical, or believed to be historical, cases of the historical Judge Dee.

Chinese district magistrates were completely responsible for peace and order in their districts, and in the investigation of serious crimes, they acted as judge, prosecutor, and detective. In the course of investigating his cases, Dee uses deceit, disguise, divination, dreams, and also threats and torture. Chinese law required that no one could be executed without a confession, and so even a case with overwhelming evidence might require torture. On the other hand, if an accused person died under torture without confessing, the magistrate and his entire staff could be executed. So, it was a potentially risky strategy.

The three cases are a bride poisoned on her wedding night, a double murder involving two silk merchants in a small town in the district, and a murder of small shopkeeper in another small town. That last murder wasn't recognized as murder for nearly a year, until Judge Dee, investigating the case of the silk merchants, overhears a remark about the death, the widow's retreat from all social life, and the fact that her young daughter has become mute. It's this case that poses the greatest danger and the greatest challenge to Dee.

The stories are good, interesting, and well-paced, and there's added interest because these stories reflect Chinese law and Chinese custom, even with the Ming dynasty anachronisms introduced by the anonymous Chinese author. It's a very enjoyable read, or listen, and well worth your time.

I bought this audiobook. ( )

In this book, Judge Dee handles three cases. In the first, two traveling silk merchants stay at a hostel and are later found murdered. The hostel owner is accused of robbing and killing them, although it's immediately clear to Judge Dee that there's more to the case than that. In the second, Judge Dee listens to an old woman's story about her son's death and her daughter-in-law's strange behavior in the period since then. He immediately suspects that the son was poisoned and that his wife had something to do with it. But can he get her to confess? The third case involves a beautiful young bride who may have been poisoned by a jealous scholar.

Although van Gulik explained in his notes that, contrary to modern Western mystery readers' expectations, Judge Dee would be handling these cases simultaneously, I didn't initially understand what that meant. I figured that it would be like mystery novels where one mystery takes precedence but little ones crop up in the middle for a bit of variety. Or perhaps it would be more like a short story anthology, with each story stitched together with transitional scenes in which criminals were punished or Judge Dee got caught up on his paperwork.

Instead, Judge Dee went hunting for clues/information about the double murder and accidentally stumbled across another mystery. He couldn't just ignore it, so he started investigating that one too. And, although a single symbolism-filled dream gave Judge Dee hints for all three cases, none of the cases were related in any way. It was definitely different from what I'm used to in my mystery reading, but not in a bad way.

All right, backing up a bit: I originally bought this during a used book shopping trip because I remembered watching and enjoying Detective Dee and the Phantom Flame. It was way more action-packed than this book, and I don't recall the movie's Detective Dee ever torturing anyone the way Judge Dee did, but I might have blocked that out. Still, despite the differences, I'm glad the movie got me to try this book.

While I probably would have found the mysteries interesting without van Gulik's notes, there are several aspects of the book that likely would have taken me aback without the context that he provided. The torture, for one thing, as well as the way some of the final sentencing was carried out. There was also a bit of an edutainment factor - van Gulik's analysis of the legal aspects of the book was fascinating, and I'm looking forward to eventually reading the original Judge Dee books he wrote after translating this book.

I was somewhat worried that this would be a dry read, but thankfully that turned out not to be the case, and van Gulik's notes added another level to my enjoyment. Although this can't quite be read with the same expectations one might have for a modern Western mystery - it was a shock when, before even seeing the crime scene, Judge Dee had a warden beaten for the way he'd handled the investigation's initial steps, and I winced at the part where Judge Dee decided to forgo an autopsy on a poisoning victim because the victim's family was so scholarly and respectable - it wasn't as far outside modern mystery expectations as I thought it might be. There were even a few nice humorous bits here and there (or at least humorous to me). I got a kick out of the false name Judge Dee chose for himself at one point in the story, as well as Ma Joong (one of Judge Dee's lieutenants) excitement at getting to play the part of a thief.

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.) ( )

Enjoyable as a mystery novel, but mostly interesting to me for all the knowledge it provides on daily life, society, government, and law in Tang China. ( )

I listened to this on Audible this time; I read all the Judge Dee books years ago and enjoyed this one again.

Van Gulik was born in the Netherlands, but grew up in Jakarta -- then Batavia. He learned a lot of languages well and took a PhD in Leiden before becoming a diplomat, then worked in Japan until the Japanese declared war on Netherlands in 1941. He went to China, and became fascinated with the Chinese detective mystery. He's an interesting character himself, and I've just convinced myself to search out a biography — or write one! ( )

Only the first part can truly be called a mystery, the second part was more about restoring the Li's to the throne. ( )