‘Reads like a mashup of The Godfather and Chinatown, complete with gun battles, a ruthless kingpin and a mountain of cash. Except that it’s all true.’ Time In this thrilling panorama of real-life events, the bestselling author of Empire of Pain investigates a secret world run by a surprising criminal: a charismatic middle-aged grandmother, who from a tiny noodle shop in New York’s Chinatown, managed a multimillion-dollar business smuggling people. In The Snakehead, Patrick Radden Keefe reveals the inner workings of Cheng Chui Ping aka Sister Ping’s complex empire and recounts the decade-long FBI investigation that eventually brought her down. He follows an often incompetent and sometimes corrupt INS as it pursues desperate immigrants risking everything to come to America, and along the way he paints a stunning portrait of a generation of undocumented immigrants and the intricate underground economy that sustains and exploits them. Grand in scope yet propulsive in narrative force, The Snakehead is both a kaleidoscopic crime story and a brilliant exploration of the ironies of immigration in America.

While working with the Australian Secret Service on a dangerous mission, teenaged spy Alex Rider uncovers information about his parents.

Life on Perseus's island of Serifos hangs in a precarious state of balance - the legacy of war - but his own routines are relaxed and calm. However, a beautiful stranger arrives and shatters the peace for everyone. Perseus is smitten, but others are suspicious, for Andromeda has a unique and potentially powerful gift. But she also has a harsh destiny to fulfil. She must die to save her people, and a stunning, word-changing discovery will die with her - unless Perseus abandons all his beliefs to confront the horror of the Medusa quest. In a mesmerising novel which combines Ann Halam's own skilful blend of magic realism with the rich otherwordly power of a favourite Greek myth, this is a story of hope and survival, and the sheer determination of two young people against all the odds.

In the fourth of Peter May's acclaimed China Thrillers, American pathologist Margaret Campbell finds herself back on home soil, only to be faced by a truck full of dead Chinese and an unavoidable confrontation with her past. Beijing detective Li Yan, now based at the Chinese embassy in Washington, is dispatched to find out how his fellow countrymen suffocated in a sealed refrigeration unit in southern Texas - only to find himself face-to-face with the woman who walked out of China, and his life, to return to the U.S. Tasked to work together again to find out who is behind the $100 million trade in illegal Chinese immigrants which led to the tragedy in Texas, they discover that the immigrants were unwitting carriers of a deadly cargo. And still wrestling with the demons of their pasts, Li and Margaret find themselves racing against time to defuse a biological time-bomb that threatens to wipe out not only their future, but that of humankind.

This title explores the role of snakehead fish in introduced environments, how humans helped spread the species, the threats they pose to ecosystems, and efforts being taken to manage them. This book also includes a table of contents, two infographics, informative sidebars, a “That’s Amazing!” special feature, quiz questions, a glossary, additional resources, and an index. This Focus Readers title is at the Navigator level, aligned to reading levels of grades 3–5 and interest levels of grades 4–7.