A Christian Science Monitor Best Book of the Year
Lilian Shang, a history professor in Maryland, knew that her father, Gary, had been the most important Chinese spy ever caught in the United States. But when she discovers his diary after the death of her parents, its pages reveal the full pain and longing that his double life entailed—and point to a hidden second family that he’d left behind in China.
As Lilian follows her father’s trail back into the Chinese provinces, she begins to grasp the extent of her father’s dilemma—torn between loyalty to his motherland and the love he came to feel for his adopted country. As she starts to understand that Gary, too, had been betrayed, she finds that it is up to her to prevent his tragedy from endangering yet another generation of the Shangs. A stunning portrait of a multinational family, an unflinching inquiry into the meaning of patriotism, A Map of Betrayal is a spy novel that only Ha Jin could write.
“Powerful. . . . A heartbreaking portrait of a spy torn between two countries.” —The Christian Science Monitor
“A startling thriller. . . . A moving family saga. . . . A subtle page-turner. . . . Expertly chronicles the fraught relationship between the U.S. and modern China with plainspoken clarity.” —Entertainment Weekly
“Deftly explores the parallels between an immigrant’s experience and an informant’s—the ambivalence, the delusion, the sense of warring loyalties.” —The New Yorker
“Ha Jin’s writing has a serene simplicity. . . . It is comforting as a reader to be in the hands of such a masterful storyteller.” —The Seattle Times
“A poignant novel that portrays the emotional drama of an immigrant torn apart by conflicting loyalties and ‘bone-deep loneliness’. . . . [Gary] may be a traitor and a superspy, but his tragedy is relatable. . . . It should strike many close to home.” —Los Angeles Times
“Ha Jin has captured the painful, often humdrum essence of the hidden agent. . . . We see America through the eyes of a Chinese émigré, torn between an old loyalty and growing affection for the adopted land he is betraying.” —The New York Times Book Review
“One of the great triumphs of A Map of Betrayal is how it uncovers and underscores the similarities between the domestic and the political, the family and the larger culture. . . . Lilian strives not to judge but to understand. She searches for a capacious, forgiving, and subtle interpretation of a struggling soul.” —The Boston Globe
“With one foot in China and the other in the United States, Ha Jin is the quintessential Chinese-American writer. . . . In his absorbing new book, A Map of Betrayal, the author offers his most searing portrait yet of divided loyalties.” —Chicago Tribune
“The book stands out for the way it straddles a number of worlds—China and the U.S., family life and adultery—and in Shang's case, the torturous inner life of a man torn between loyalty to two nations.” —NPR
“Beneath the quiet poetry of Ha Jin’s sentences is a searing novelistic ambition.” —The Millions
“Beautifully written. . . . Brilliant fiction, a story of shifting personal loyalties across broad swaths of territory, that can only be done by one with a deep knowledge of two cultures: in [Jin’s] case, China and America.” —Buffalo News
“A quietly humane, painstakingly detailed portrait of an idealistic man who tries to set himself morally apart. Ever present in this dense, compelling tale are provocative questions about the nature of patriotism: When do you betray your country? When does your country betray you?” —Shelf Awareness
“Gripping. . . . Poignant. . . . A haunting tale of two families and two countries that are linked together by the life of a single spy. . . . The novel closes with a delicate, ironic twist that one associates with the best of Jin’s fiction.” —BookPage
“A chillingly matter-of-fact tale of espionage and treachery. . . . Ha Jin offers startlingly redefining views of the strategic evolution of U.S.-Chinese relations. . . . A sharply ironic, stealthily devastating tale of the tragic cost of ‘blind’ patriotism, told by a master of clarifying fiction, uniting the personal and the geopolitical.” —Booklist (starred)
