Ghost Month

<b>Welcome to Unknown Pleasures a food stand in Taipei's night market named after a Joy Division album and also the location for a big-hearted new mystery set in the often undocumented Taiwan.</b><br><br>August is Ghost Month in Taiwan&#151;a time to pay respects to the dead and avoid unlucky omens. Jing-nan who runs a food stand in a bustling Taipei night market isn&#146;t superstitious but this August will haunt him nonetheless. He learns that his high school sweetheart has been murdered&#151;found scantily clad near a highway where she was selling betel nuts. Beyond his harrowing grief Jing-nan is confused. &#147;Betel nut beauties&#148; are typically women in desperate circumstances but Julia Huang was high school valedictorian and the last time Jing-nan spoke to her she was far away happily enrolled in NYU&#146;s honor program. The facts don&#146;t add up. Julia&#146;s parents don&#146;t think so either but the police seem to have closed the case without asking any questions. The Huangs beg Jing-nan to do some investigating&#151;reconnect with old classmates see if he can learn anything more about Julia&#146;s last years. Reluctantly he agrees for Julia&#146;s sake. But nothing can prepare him for what he is about to learn or how it will change his life.