“ Surprises and mysteries abound here. This novel taught me more about Tibet—modern and ancient—than I had managed to learn elsewhere over the years.”—The Washington Post

“Frightening and unforgettable.”—Publishers Weekly

“Stories wrapped around other stories brocaded with abundant local color and told with leisure and elegance form a heady literary tapestry.”—Kirkus Reviews

“Once again, Edgar Award winner Pattison demonstrates his mastery.”—Library Journal (starred review)

“Fascinating. . . . Pattison writes convincingly of Tibetan culture and religion, Chinese-Tibetan politics, Himalayan geography and Navajo religious beliefs, while giving his characters believable personalities.”—The Free Lance-Star (Fredericksburg, VA)

Summoned to a remote village from the hidden lamasery where he lives, Shan, formerly an investigator in Beijing, must save a comatose man from execution for two murders in which the victims’ arms have been removed. Upon arrival, he discovers that the suspect is not Tibetan but Navajo. The man has come with his niece to seek ancestral ties between their people and the ancient Bon. The recent murders are only part of a chain of deaths. Together with his friends, the monks Gendun and Lokesh, Shan solves the riddle of Dragon Mountain, the place “where the world begins.”

Eliot Pattison is an international lawyer based near Philadelphia. His four previous Shan novels, set in Tibet—The Skull Mantra (St. Martin’s Press, 1999), Water Touching Stone (2001), Bone Mountain (2002) and Beautiful Ghosts (2004)—have been critical and commercial successes. He won the Edgar Award for Best First Novel and was nominated for the Crime Writers’ Association Golden Dagger Award.