Feisty Dr. Siri Paiboun is no respecter of persons or party; at his age he feels he can afford to be independent. In this, the second novel in the series, he travels to Luang Prabang, where he communes with the deposed king who is resigned to his fate: it was predicted long ago. And he attends a conference of shamans called by the Communist Party to deliver an ultimatum to the spirits: obey party orders or get out. But as a series of mutilated

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An elderly man has been run down by a logging truck on the street in Vientiane just opposite the post office. His body is delivered to the morgue of Dr. Siri Paiboun, the official and only coroner of Laos. At the age of seventy-three, Siri is too old to be in awe of the new communist bureaucrats for whom he now works. Before he can identify the corpse, he must decipher a letter in the man's pocket—it is written in invisible ink and in code.

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In peaceful Buddhist Laos, Dr. Siri confronts a deadly Casanova targeting lovely young women.

"Laos, 1981: When an unofficial mailman drops off a strange bilingual diary, Dr. Siri is intrigued. Half is in Lao, but the other half is in Japanese, which no one Siri knows can read; it appears to have been written during the Second World War. Most mysterious of all, it comes with a note stapled to it: Dr. Siri, we need your help most urgently. But who is 'we', and why have they left no return address? To the chagrin of his wife and friends, who...

"Alisak, Prany, and Noi--three orphans united by devastating loss - must do what is necessary to survive the perilous landscape of 1960s Laos. When they take shelter in a bombed out field hospital, they meet Vang, a doctor dedicated to helping the wounded at all costs. Soon the teens are serving as motorcycle couriers, delicately navigating their bikes across the fields filled with unexploded bombs, beneath the indiscriminate barrage from the sky....

"Aidyn Kelley is talented, ambitious, and ready for a more serious assignment than the fluff pieces she's been getting as a cub reporter for the Kansas City Star. In her eagerness, she pushes too hard, earning herself the menial task of writing an obituary for an unremarkable woman who's just entered hospice care. But there's more to Clara Kip than meets the eye. The spirited septuagenarian may be dying, but she's not quite ready to cash it in yet....

"1980: The Democratic People's Republic of Laos is proud to be competing in its first-ever Olympics. Of course, half the world is boycotting the Moscow Summer Olympic Games to protest Russia's recent invasion of Afghanistan, but that has made room for athletes from countries that are usually too small or underfunded to be competitive--countries like Laos. Ex-national coroner of Laos Dr. Siri Paiboun may be retired, but he and his wife, Madame Daeng,...

"A death threat to Dr. Siri and all his friends sends the ex-coroner down memory lane in the 14th installment of Cotterill's quirky, critically acclaimed series set in 1970s Laos. Vientiane, 1980: Laos is celebrating its fifth anniversary of communist rule, and Dr. Siri and his crew couldn't be less thrilled. But really, things could be a lot worse. Madame Daeng's noodle shop is thriving, Tukta and Geung are on their honeymoon, and Siri and Civilai...