BAD TRAFFIC

UK version/Sort Of Books
(30 January 2008)
ISBN 978-0-95489-955-4

US version/Hardcover/Scribner
(8 December 2008)
ISBN 978-1416593539
Paperback
ISBN-10: 1416596046
ISBN-13: 978-1416596042
(May 18 2010)

German /Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verla
Translated by Silke Jellinghaus
(June 2009)
ISBN-10: 3499249537
ISBN-13: 978-3499249532

Swedish /Schibasted
Kinaschack/Translated by Rosetta Sten
(21 January 2009)
ISBN: 9789177388036

Italian /Baldini Castoldi Dalai
UNO SPORCO TRAFFICO
(19 May 2009)
ISBN: 88-6073-555

French /Actes Sud
Trafic Sordide
(2 September 2009)
ISBN: 978-2742786497

武田ランダムハウスジャパン
黒竜江から来た警部
(9 July 2010)
ISBN: 978-4270103579

‘THIS MAN HAVE COME FROM CHINA TO FIND HIS DAUGHTER WHO HAVE SOME TROUBLE. HE DO NOT SPEAK ENGLISH’

Inspector Jian is a Chinese cop who thinks he's seen it all. But his search for his missing daughter brings him to the meanest streets he's ever faced -in rural England.
Migrant worker Ding Ming is distressed - his gangmaster's making demands, he owes a lot of money to the snakeheads and no one will tell him where his wife has been taken. Maybe England isn't the 'gold mountain' he was promised.
Two desperate men, uneasy allies in a baffling foreign land, are pitted against a band of ruthless people smugglers... there's BAD TRAFFIC ahead.

'Following Chinese points of view in a thriller set in the UK is inspired writing. Bad Traffic is a honey: suspense that never loses its grip.'
Elmore Leonard

'A unique story narrated through conflicting yet complementing perspectives. With vivid characterizations in an unprecedented milieu, and an odyssey against impossible odds, Simon Lewis succeeds in producing a moving, convincing thriller.'
Qiu Xiaolong

'Bad Traffic is a thrilling read as well as a study of social ! problems and a people dislocated in a foreign country. Simon's understanding and sensitivity toward the Chinese people and culture gives the book its memorable depth. His characters are keenly observed and deftly drawn. I finished the book from cover to cover in one sitting.'
Diane Wei Liang

'Lewis's narrative is fast-moving and flawless. His story dances between the comedy of cultural confusion and the tragedy of broken lives and broken dreams. It's said to be the first in a series about Inspector Jian. My advice is to get in on the ground floor.'
The Washington Post

'"Bad Traffic" is a rabbit-hole that a reader is willingly sucked into, its fast pace and staccato style a preliminary enticement to deeper insights into the changing nature of Chinese mores. '
Los Angeles Times

'An enjoyable culture clash thriller... An engaging and unusual tale.'
Guardian

'Lewis's aim was to write a book that was "fast-paced and pulpy, with a high body count and plenty of action". He has certainly succeeded, but there's more besides - dark comedy, sensitive characterisation and an incisive rendering of the desperation felt by beleaguered strangers in a foreign land.'
Observer

'A policeman from mainland China arrives in rural Britain in search of his missing daughter who is studying tourism at Leeds University, but hasn't been seen for weeks. Jian does not speak a word of English but, using native cunning, he follows a trail that leads him into the murky world of illegal immigration and the Chinese snakeheads who front it. He forms an alliance with Ding Ming, a hapless Chinese immigrant who has escaped from his 'master' Kevin who is overseeing cockle pickers on Morecambe Bay. Through their eyes we are introduced to an alien Britain, a cold, frightening, unknown land where poor people who have been promised proper wages to send home are terrorised and exploited. If that sounds grim, it is; but this story is utterly compelling and not without humour.'
Daily Mail

'... a fast-paced, refreshingly different thriller that owes much of its success to its two central characters.'
Sunday Telegraph

'can a writer make a good book out of moral indignation? Lewis does a brilliant job, creating a fast-moving narrative out of Inspector Jian's search for his daughter.'
Independent

'This is a fast-paced, powerhouse of a novel leaving the reader wanting to hear more of Inspector Jian.'
Tangled Web

'Lewis offers not one, but two, outsiders - with every reason to mistrust each other -experiencing a culture clash with an entire country while engaged in a violent chase through an underworld that exists almost without reference to British society. As a bonus, he wraps his ingenuity in heady pulp prose and never stints on the shoot-outs.'
Telegraph

'The most exciting and original new voice in crime fiction since Ian Rankin.'
Matt Thorne

'Simon Lewis has a superb sense of pace. As Jian and Ding Li skitter about the country, pursued by or pursuing the men who run the illegal immigrants, it's almost impossible to put the book down. It seemed unlikely that there could be any satisfactory resolution to the situation, but the ending is a tour de force which completely took me by surprise.'
Sue Magee, The Bookbag

'Top of the menu is a fabulous novel by Simon Lewis, which will be one of my outstanding books of 2008.... BAD TRAFFIC is an absolutely exceptional novel which had me mesmerised. It feels like a noir film, and has a distinct cinematic quality to it. The fact that the point of view is so firmly rooted with Jian and Ding Ming is what makes the book so powerful. Human trafficking and migrant workers are themes popping up frequently in modern crime fiction but Simon Lewis gives it a gritty and moving twist. BAD TRAFFIC is a first venture into crime fiction for tiny London publishers Sort Of Books. Both they and Lewis look destined for much bigger things.'
Reviewing the Evidence

Go

Corgi Books
(published in 1999)
Originally published by Pulp Books (1998)
ISBN 0-552-14717-6

Italian/Marco Tropea Editore
ISBN 9-78843-801831

German/Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag
ISBN 3-499-227150

Swedish/Albert Bonniers Forlag
ISBN 91-0-057183-0

How far do you have to go to get away? Problems at home? Ripped off your boss? Think you've killed someone?
It's time to go...

Lee, Sol and Vix are on the run - from police, gangsters, parents... themselves. As they travel through Asia on separate quests, their paths cross. But it doesn't matter how far you go, reality always catches up with you...

'Alongside Alex Garland and William Sutcliffe, Lewis is one of the pioneers of new travel fiction. And of the three he is the most in tune with experience of traveling and the possibilities it offers fiction.'
Nicholas Blincoe, Observer

'The pace and wit of Elmore Leonard with Alan Bennettish realism... highly accomplished and enjoyable'
The Times

'Confident, sharp as a tack, fast paced and blackly funny from begining to end.'
Big Issue

'Go drags you halfway around the world and expects you to keep up but you are happy to do it.'
Observer

'Read of the week... an entertaining read from a promising young writer who puts an often amusing spin on subject matter it's all too easy to be cynical about.'
The Big Issue in the North

'Sharp, fast, funny'
I-D Magazine

'South London gunplay and backpacker slack, jet trash characters with gold dust prose - Simon Lewis mixes it all up with style.'
Toby Litt, writer

Simon Lewis has been published in:

All Hail the New Puritans

Edited by Nicholas Blincoe
and Matt Thorne
Fourth Estate (2000)
ISBN 1-84115-349-4

Fifteen writers; ten rules. The aim of this anthology was to bring together a group of like-minded writers and set them a challenge.

'An impressive showcase of hard-edged contemporary fiction'
Boyd Tonkin, Independent

'A new breed of young British writers who are desining fiction for the 21st century'
Vogue

Simon Lewis has been published in:

Fortune Hotel

Edited by Sarah Champion
Penguin Fiction(1999)
ISBN 0-14-028108-8

This is a book for anyone who has ever had grim experience in a hotel room or backpacked in Asia.

'Fortune Hotel is about real-life characters...travelling to escape, to rekindle relationships or to forget the past. They seek enlightment, adventure or oblivion.'
Financial Times

'A hip, diverse collection'
Mirror