MANDARIN GOLD

‘Highly absorbing account of the corruption of an individual during a particularly sordid era of British imperial history’ The Sunday Times

‘With pace and ingenuity, Leasor tells how the China coast was forced open to English traders.’ Evening Standard

‘Meticulously researched… the detail of the Emperor’s lavish court is fascinating.’ Manchester Evening News

China, 1833. The vast Qing Empire still appears unassailable, but the first cracks are beginning to show. Along the China coast, Western merchants are growing rich through the illegal opium trade, while governments and trading companies compete for influence in one of history’s greatest commercial prizes.

Into this dangerous world comes Robert Gunn, an ambitious young Scotsman determined to make his fortune. Drawn ever deeper into a ruthless world of merchants, smugglers, mandarins and adventurers, Gunn discovers that wealth demands compromise, power demands betrayal, and every success carries a moral cost.

From the bustling ports of Canton to the hidden enclaves of the China coast, Mandarin Gold is a gripping historical novel of intrigue, violence and ambition, set against the events that would soon lead to the Opium Wars and reshape the balance of power between East and West.

Richly researched and vividly told, James Leasor’s Mandarin Gold is both an epic adventure and a compelling portrait of one man’s descent into corruption in an age when fortunes were built on greed and empires were bought and sold.