The fifth volume in an extraordinary SF series set 200 years in the future when China rules the world. With Triad bosses and assassins, emperors, whores and visionaries, it is part heroic epic, part technological thriller, part romance - a compelling tale of fallen empires and ordinary people unified only by the dark history of their time.
The Council of Seven ruled Chung Kuo with an iron authority, their boast that they had ended Change and stopped the Great Wheel turning. But war, famine and political instability, thought to be things of the past, had returned to Chung Kuo with a vengeance. A new generation of powerful young merchants - Dispersionists - challenged the authority of the Seven, leading to what became known as 'the War-That-Wasn't-A-War' - a nasty, guerrilla form of warfare fought in the claustrophobic levels of the Cities. A brutal war without rules. A war the Seven ultimately won. But only just. And now the Seven find themselves vulnerable as the forces against them continue to grow.