So recently, I came across an old post (from 2020!!) that I wrote about series that I wanted to read more of and was mildly horrified at myself because out of the eight series I listed, I’ve only finished one and that’s the Jackaby series. Since I was going to be in the vicinity of a library, I decided to make a trip and borrow one book from one of the authors listed here.

The book turned out to be The Shadow of the Empire by Qiu Xiaolong. It’s a historical mystery set in the Tang dyasnty and inspired by a real life case. In The Shadow of the Empire, Judge Dee investigates a mysterious death – the maid of a celebrated poetess-courtesan is found dead and buried in a shallow grave. Initially, the poetess Xuanji denies any knowledge, and then abruptly admits the crime.

When Judge Dee investigates, he realises that there may be more to this case, with the locals invoking a black fox spirit and two more deaths that look like they are related.

What I enjoyed about this novel, apart from the mystery, was the use of poetry. Xuanji is a renowned poetess and her poems and those that are written to her are quoted in the story itself. For me, the poetry added depth and flavour to the story. In fact, the appendix of the book is a collection of poems by Xuanji and various others from the Tang dynasty, and I enjoyed delving deeper into these poems after having enjoyed the mystery.

I also appreciated the careful research in this novel. Qiu Xiaolong was inspired by Robert van Gulik (who actually wrote many Judge Dee novels after finding a story about him), who was in turn inspired by the real case of Xuanji. The postscript makes it clear what is real (e.g. Judge Dee, Xuanji, a few other characters) and what is not (Judge Dee and Xuanji didn’t appear in the same point in the Tang dynasty), and I ended up learning a bit about what I initially thought was a wholly fictional story!

Another place the research shone through was in Judge Dee’s actions as a Confucian official. There’s quite a bit of discussion about some of the political debates happening around that time, and what I read from Judge Dee about his views fit in with what I understand of Confucianism.

Overall, I thought this was a great book. If you’re looking to learn more about Tang dynasty China and its people and poetry while enjoying a novel, I think this would be a great place to start. If any of the poetry catches your eye, I think you’ll be able to find more collections or see who you want to read up on without too much difficulty.