Second Sister

By Chan Ho-kei

Gossip. Rumour. Revenge.
Wun Wah Tower. Kwun Tong district, Hong Kong.

When Siu-Man jumped from her window on the twenty-second floor, everyone assumed it was suicide. But Sui-Man's sister, Nga-Yee, a quiet and unassuming librarian, is determined to prove it was murder. The police aren't interested in re-opening a solved case so she contacts a man known only as N. – a hacker, and an expert in cybersecurity and manipulating human behaviour.

What follows is a cat-and-mouse game through the vibrant city of Hong Kong. The pair's investigation takes them from creepy commuter-train gropers to Siu-Man's gossipy friends to the dark corners of the city's digital underground – where online bullies, sexual predators and shady tech businesses stalk their prey...
Reviews for Second Sister:
'An elaborate plot' New York Times

'Moves at a breathtaking pace and, with its bounty of high-tech hazard, excites like a vintage Tom Clancy novel' Wall Street Journal

'An important, multidimensional and even educational read into the dangers of cyber bullying' The Straits Times

'Sharp-witted and intense... Dangerous feuds, cybertheft, and a predator stalking Hong Kong' Booklist

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Release date: Feb 18, 2020
• ISBN: 9781788547109

Chan Ho-kei

Chan Ho-Kei was raised in Hong Kong. He has won the Mystery Writers of Taiwan Award for his short stories, and In 2011 he won the Soji Shimada, the biggest mystery award in the Chinese world. He lives in Taiwan.

Reviews for Second Sister

[mpho3 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A distinctly Hongkongese work, Second Sister is culturally illuminating in its descriptions of Hong Kong mores but universal in its depiction of the ills enabled by society immersed in social media. The book opens with a young woman's death. Chan Ho-Kei draws a tragic portrait of life for an economically challenged family before delving into the impetus for her demise. Her older sister, Nga-Yee, is the foil through which we meet the hacker hero detective who goes by N. He is a brilliant but misanthropic, narcissistic, cantankerous, jerk with a superiority complex. He is also bona fide good at what he does and has a few secrets of his own. Nga-Yee takes a lot of abuse from him but also somehow manages to hold her own as she learns all manner of things about human behavior and about computer forensics, the dark web, and the many ways hackers take advantage of the vulnerabilities to which most of us unwittingly leave ourselves open. I didn't understand most of the tech stuff but found it fascinating nonetheless. Further, it's a pretty good crime story filled with lies, misdirects, maybe a revenge story.

[brangwinn · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Themes in this book: Crime doesn’t pay, Online harassment is a problem around the world, just because you are paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you, via technology big brother is watching you and modern-day Robin Hoods do exist. When a high school student commits suicide in Hong Kong, her sister is determined to see revenge on the person she thinks caused the suicide. At times I was confused, perhaps it was the translation but more likely I was totally lost in the world and language of hackers. The dual stories in the book kept combining in my mind and that didn’t help either. Despite the problems I had reading it, I thoroughly enjoyed Second Sister. I know I will never begin to understand the workings of the grouchy hacker detective even if I tried to outline how his thought pattern worked. Needless to say, “N” is the detective of the future.